


to have and to hold

by andromedagalaxy



Series: Philkas College Verse [58]
Category: Eyewitness (US TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-06
Updated: 2018-04-06
Packaged: 2019-04-19 08:40:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 21,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14233515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andromedagalaxy/pseuds/andromedagalaxy
Summary: Lukas pulls Philip into a hug. They don’t say anything either—Philip just closes his eyes and holds on to Lukas, the two of them swaying back and forth.You’re amazing. I mean, you’re awesome.The words echo in his ears. Times past, love growing in the midst of fear and uncertainty. All that horror giving way to softness, dedication, the kind of relationship he could only dream about. He realizes he doesn’t need to focus hard on all this to keep it in place. He’s found something special, and it’s simply part of his life now.“Let’s go get married, babe,” Philip says, kissing Lukas’s neck.“Yeah,” Lukas says, when they break apart. “Yeah, that sounds fun.”(Philip and Lukas's Wedding)





	to have and to hold

Philip usually tries to do more driving when they rent a car, but he doesn’t think he would have been able to do the driving for this trip, at least not on the way there. He sits in the passenger seat and listens to Lukas singing Sum 41, listens to him laugh when the dogs howl along, but other than the soundtrack, things are relatively quiet. He’s got his phone hooked up to the fancy Bluetooth in the car and he keeps picking songs he knows Lukas likes so he’ll keep singing. Lukas’s voice soothes him, grounds him.

Philip watches the landscape go by through his window, slowly shifting from the bustle of the city to the softness of everything outside of it. The whole rest of the world seems soft to Philip, where everything in his new life seems sharp. Like sometimes he’s focusing too hard on keeping it all together, keeping it for himself. Like he’s concentrating on maintaining his happiness.

He knows, rationally, that he doesn’t have to do that anymore. They’re driving home to have their wedding. Their real, official wedding. The one that, years ago, he never would have pictured. The one that, in his wildest dreams, he never would have thought of. He never thought he’d get married to anybody. Especially not to Lukas.

“Philip.”

Philip looks over at him. “Yeah?”

“Do you like my singing?” Lukas asks. He grins. Even after all this time, Philip’s heart flutters at the sight of that smile.

“You know you’re the worst,” Philip says, grinning back.

“But the best of the worst, right?” Lukas asks.

“Yes,” Philip says, nodding definitively. “For sure.”

“Have I ever told you that Winter Philip is among my favorite Philips?” Lukas says, eyeing him. 

Philip laughs, adjusting his jacket around his shoulders. “This jacket always makes me feel like a marshmallow man, but it’s warm.”

“You’re the sexiest marshmallow I’ve ever seen,” Lukas says. 

“I knew you liked food more than you should,” Philip quips, and Lukas reaches over and pokes him, making him squirm. Philip grins, shifting more towards the window.

“I also like Winter Izzy and Samson because we get to make them wear sweaters,” Lukas says, looking over his shoulder. “Halloween is just not enough time to dress them up.”

Izzy makes a little noise like she understands what he’s saying. Philip snorts, shaking his head and staring out the windshield. The snow isn’t coming down as hard as it has been, and he’s glad for that. They kept picturing their wedding with a light snowfall, something to make it really pretty, but he knows the universe can have other ideas sometimes. He keeps having visions of a goddamn snowstorm when he thinks too hard about the wedding, so he tries not to think about it at all.

Easier said than done.

Lukas reaches across the console and threads their fingers together. “Freaking out at all?”

Philip shakes his head. “Not about the wedding. Well, not really. More about like—telling them.” He snorts, laughs to keep from crying. Vegas. It always feels like an albatross around his neck, a storm cloud that crops up when things finally feel sunny. It’s a good memory, what they can remember of it. But it’s also a big fucking secret.

“I thought we said after the honeymoon?” Lukas asks, squeezing his hand a little bit.

Philip shrugs. “I guess we’ll do it when it feels right.”

“Are you really considering doing it at the wedding?” Lukas asks, sounding apprehensive. 

“I don’t think so,” Philip says, but he really isn’t sure. He feels like one day he’s gonna blurt it out when he doesn’t want to.

“Well, let me know if you think you’re gonna do it,” Lukas says. “I’ll back you up.”

Philip smiles, bringing Lukas’s hand up to his mouth and kissing it. He holds it in his lap and tries not to think about how in the fuck he’d ever bring up Vegas at this point without it being an insane conversation. There’s no possible way. It’s gonna suck no matter what.

“Hopefully they’re pretty much all set up for the rehearsal dinner when we get there,” Lukas says.

“I think they will be,” Philip says. “Helen wanted to make sure we didn’t have a lot to worry about.” He smiles to himself, playing with Lukas’s fingers. “They booked us a hotel in Poughkeepsie for the wedding night.”

Lukas laughs outright. “Thank God,” he says. “I was worried we were just expected to come back to one of our houses.”

“Nope,” Philip says, looking at him. “We’re gonna leave the dogs with your dad, maybe Helen if she gets territorial, spend the night at the hotel, come back, do lunch or something, then go home.”

“Go home married,” Lukas says. 

“Officially,” Philip says. “Well…openly, officially.”

Lukas looks at him then, one of those long meaningful looks that Philip catches him in sometimes. But he’s not trying to hide in it now, and he looks back at the road briefly before continuing to gaze at Philip.

“What?” Philip asks, starting to flush a little bit.

Lukas just shakes his head, chewing on his lower lip.

~

It’s snowing less in Tivoli, which Philip thanks his lucky stars for, and the decorations are already up when they get there. They make a bee-line for the barn once they’ve got the dogs on leashes, and Philip nearly loses his breath when he takes it all in. Everything is all set up for the ceremony save for the flowers, which are apparently going to arrive early the morning of the wedding. But the arch is there at the end of the aisle in the barn, and all of the benches are laid out already.

Philip tugs Lukas through the barn doors, his mouth hanging open. The lights are strung up in the rafters, hanging easy, all the strings perfectly aligned. He can see where the flowers are going to go, empty mason jars hanging on the walls and at the ends of the aisles. None of it is too over the top—he’d balked at the prospect of a wedding when he realized he was gay, and he worried even more when it felt like a real possibility with Lukas. It couldn’t be anything ridiculous, nothing too flouncy or gauzy.

But this…so far, this is perfect.

“It looks fucking awesome,” Lukas says, kissing Philip’s temple and laughing a little bit. The dogs dance around and pull at their leashes and seem like they know something exciting is happening. “They cleaned the place up really good, I can’t believe it.”

“Me either,” Philip says, still looking around at it all.

“We’re doing the rehearsal dinner in the back yard, right?”

“Yeah,” Helen’s voice says, from behind them. “We’ve got the little tent up, we’re putting the tables underneath it.” They both turn around and see her standing there, shaking her head. She walks closer, patting both excited dogs on their heads. “Gabe owes me twenty bucks. I knew you two would be traipsing up in here before you even came to see us.”

“Sorry,” Philip says, walking forward and wrapping her in a hug. “It just looks, uh—really, really good.”

“Well, it’s not even done,” Helen says, tugging Lukas in by the arm, the both of them laughing. “We’ve got heaters put to the side just in case the weather changes, but so far the forecast says it’s gonna hold up like this, which is what you wanted.”

“Yup,” Lukas says. “Exactly what I’ve been picturing all along.”

“C’mon,” Helen says. “Stop admiring our half-finished work, we’ve got the more pressing matter of the rehearsal dinner to set up.”

“Oh, that stuff isn’t ready?” Lukas asks, throwing an arm around Helen’s shoulders. “Come on, Helen, what are we paying you for?”

She slaps him on the stomach and Philip laughs, grinning. “Your dad is here, he’s playing leader with all this rehearsal stuff—”

“Oh great,” Lukas says, looking behind Helen’s head at Philip.

“I’m sure it’s all perfect,” Philip says. 

They all walk around to the back of the house where Gabe, Bo and Sarah are seemingly ordering each other around. The tent is already up, and they have a long table and a bunch of chairs. Gabe is holding what looks like six different table cloths in his arms.

“Found ‘em,” Helen says, pinching Lukas’s cheek before turning to press a kiss to Philip’s. The dogs pull and pant when they see everybody else and Helen laughs, looking down at them. “You need to let them run free!”

“Yeah, if we don’t want them to come back,” Philip says.

“You gotta train ‘em better!” Gabe yells, putting the cloths down on the table. 

“Put them in their usual spot,” Sarah says. “I put food and water over there, they’ll be happy, we can work on the running around later—”

“Probably just for a little bit,” Lukas says. “Then we gotta put ‘em inside or make ‘em wear shoes. And Samson hates shoes.”

Philip grins, shaking his head.

“Alright boys,” Bo says, his hands on his hips as he surveys the situation in front of him. “We gotta get some opinions here before we all tear each other’s heads off.”

“Never in my life would I have thought you’d be arguing over table cloths and place settings,” Lukas says, laughing. He’s got the kind of joy in his eyes that Philip loves to see there. And as much as everything is set in stone in their lives, Philip still can’t believe that all this is happening. That they’re on the eve of their fucking wedding rehearsal.

It’s insane.

~

They finally figure out the rehearsal dinner setup after a lot more arguing and waffling back and forth than Philip would have expected, which Lukas keeps harping on and laughing at. They all eat a dinner of Chinese take-out inside, play with the dogs a bit until Philip is worried they’re actually gonna take off and run away, and then Bo and Sarah pack up and head out with high hopes for the next day. Philip feels good too, almost too good, like he’s waiting for the other shoe to drop and something to go wrong. But he tries to keep himself from thinking like that. 

They set the dogs up in the living room, since that’s where they’ve been tending to sleep lately when they stay here. Samson is already knocked out on the couch, but Izzy is taking full advantage of having the food and snack bowls to herself. 

They’re making up Philip’s bed and Philip watches Lukas, thinking about some of the things that were said today since they’ve been here. 

“When was the last time you saw your grandma?” Philip asks, tucking in the corner of the sheet.

Lukas makes a little face, shifting his mouth. “God, a couple years? You were in the room when I was on the phone with her that time.”

There’s a flicker of worry in Philip’s throat and he tries to swallow it down. “You think she’ll, uh…you think…” He thinks of Bo in the beginning. The very beginning. The fire and disdain and caution in his eyes. The deep held prejudice. 

Lukas looks up at him and smiles a little bit. “She always seems fine. I mention you—she’s pretty old, so I think she’s like—she kinda takes it as it comes. She doesn’t have a real big—I don’t know, she isn’t like my dad. I mean, how he was.”

“Yeah?” Philip asks, picking at a stray thread on his old comforter.

“Yeah,” Lukas says, and he sounds pretty sure. “Dad wouldn’t have invited her if he thought she’d be weird or anything.”

“Okay,” Philip says, nodding, and if Lukas says so, then he’s sure too. He walks over and plants a kiss on Lukas’s cheek, tugging him into a hug. “You know, you don’t hug me enough.”

Lukas scoffs, dropping the blanket he’d been holding and closing his arms around Philip’s middle. He slots their bodies together and sways them back and forth, holding him tight. “You mean like this?”

Philip turns his face into Lukas’s neck and breathes him in. “Mmm, yeah.”

“Not enough hugs,” Lukas huffs, kissing Philip’s cheek over and over, rubbing his back. “As if.”

“Just like you complaining about not enough kisses,” Philip says, muffled against the collar of Lukas’s shirt. He’s on the verge of laughter.

“Well, you definitely deprive me,” Lukas says. They both lean back at the same time like clockwork, bringing their mouths together. Philip sighs into it as they kiss, both of them still pressed together and rocking back and forth a little bit. 

Philip nuzzles their noses together when the kisses taper out. “I’m gonna go get a glass of water, you want anything?”

“If Gabe is still hoarding those cheese crackers then I want those cheese crackers,” Lukas says, smiling.

“I’ll bring you a bib too,” Philip says. 

“I am not messy.”

“Uh huh.”

“I’m not.”

Philip kisses him again. “Sure, sure.”

~

Both dogs are sleeping when Philip ventures through the living room, Izzy snoring like a full grown man as per usual. He grabs what he needs and Philip heads back to his bedroom with the water and the snacks, but then he sees Helen and Gabe’s door propped open, a sliver of light peeking through. He catches sight of Helen sitting on the edge of the bed, a book spread out on her lap. Philip debates for a second or two, and then he steps forward, pushing the door open the tiniest bit more. 

Helen looks up, smiling softly at him. “You okay?” she asks. 

“Yeah,” Philip says, quick, adjusting the crackers against his side. “You?” He glances back and sees Gabe sleeping, clearly one of those deep, knocked-out kinds of sleep he falls into nowadays, when the brightest light or loudest thunder storm can’t even disturb him. 

“Yeah,” Helen says, and it seems true. He’s gotten pretty good at reading her. She gestures for him to come inside and he does, looking down at the book in her lap. It’s a photo album. She looks a little shy about it, glancing up at him and then back down at the pictures again. “Just adding to it,” she says. “I’ve been working on this thing for a little bit now and I’m finally getting around to my favorite part.”

Philip looks at her incredulously. “What’s your favorite part?” he asks, noticing the stack of photos next to her hip, almost getting lost in the sheets. “Your wedding? Pictures of Gabe with dogs? You and Tony?”

“No, silly,” she says, shaking her head at him. “You.”

He scoffs, not sure if he heard her right. “Me?”

“Of course,” she says. 

He puts his glass and food down on her bedside table and sits next to her, trying not to rattle the bed too much. She flips through the pages a little bit and he catches sight of a few yellowed photos, a young Helen with her parents, Helen with a couple of dogs, Helen next to a couple of tall buildings and standing next to signs he can’t read. He thinks it might be her in college. It looks like there are a couple full pages of her in her police uniform, and a lot of her and Gabe. 

“They never took too many pictures when I was younger,” Helen says. “And I mean, I was glad—I never really liked having my photo taken, despite how many pictures I’ve got in here.”

“You’re pretty good about it now,” Philip says. 

“I like that you document our lives,” she says. She takes the stack in her hands and he sees a bunch of them together, most of which he’d set his camera up for, and a lot Helen had taken of him. Prom photos, both graduations, the two of them sitting together on the couch in his new apartment with Lukas. She pulls one to the front and it’s the two of them skating together in Rockefeller Center, holding hands, with Bo, Gabe and Lukas in the background. 

“That’s a great picture,” Philip says. He narrows his eyes. “Who the hell took it?”

“That random Canadian woman,” Helen says, laughing. “Probably shouldn’t have let her hold my phone for that long, but…I got my favorite photo out of it.”

“It’s cute thinking of you going to the drug store and getting all of these printed,” Philip says, resting his chin on her shoulder. 

“That machine is the worst,” she says. “But I’m happy with the results.”

His heart is doing that thing again, when it feels like it’s going to burst under the pressure of all this love. Even though his family is the most solid it’s been since hell rolled over them, he still isn’t used to how much they all love him. 

“Thanks,” he says, leaning back a little bit.

“For what?” she asks, slipping the skating photo into the next empty slot.

“For everything, but in particular—everything you’ve done for the wedding,” he says. “It’s pretty amazing, the barn isn’t even done and it’s just…perfect. I can see what it’s gonna look like finished and it’s just…so great. You guys really went all out.”

“Well, we’ve had help,” Helen says. “But it’s…important. It’s a very important day. I know how much it means to you and it means a lot to us too.” She shrugs a little bit and he’s getting nervous. She looks up and meets his eyes. “I just never had a kid, especially one that was gonna get married, and then I had you but I wasn’t sure, especially when things started with Lukas—but it’s been such an idea for so long now and—and yes, I’m very much looking forward to it.” She nods at him, almost looking delighted. “You deserve it, you really do.”

Philip clears his throat, managing a smile. “Well, hopefully…it’s the one of a kind day we’re both expecting.”

~

Philip lays with his head on Lukas’s chest, his eyes wide open. Lukas crunches cheese crackers, clearly trying his hardest not to get crumbs everywhere.

But Philip isn’t really worrying about that right now. “We’re gonna break Helen’s heart,” he says.

“Why?”

“Because she’s so amped up for this wedding but we’re already married.”

“So?” Lukas asks, his mouth pretty full. “The wedding is still gonna happen. We didn’t like say…fuck the wedding, we got married already so no real wedding.”

“Right,” Philip says, narrowing his eyes. 

“Relax,” Lukas says, eating another cracker and rubbing Philip’s shoulder. “It’s gonna be…fine. It’ll be fine.”

Philip sighs.

“You know that I love you, right?” Lukas says, tugging him closer. “Like, I know that you know, but do you really know?”

Philip snorts, looking up at him. “Yes. I know.”

Lukas’s eyes are bright, and there are a few crumbs clinging to the corner of his mouth now that Philip has broken his focus. He keeps talking. “But like…I would do anything for you, babe, and I want you to know that. I want you to know that you’re…the fucking world, to me.”

Philip’s stomach twists. “Are these your vows?”

Lukas’s eyes get wider. “No.”

“Have you written them?” Philip asks, bracing his elbow on the bed so he can look at him better. Lukas is silent and Philip grins. “I haven’t either.”

“Okay good,” Lukas says, letting out a breath Philip could tell he was holding. “But I’ve got most of it—all of them in my head.”

“Me too,” Philip says, leaning down to press a long kiss to Lukas’s mouth.

He tastes like cheese.

~

Philip has a hard time sleeping. He listens to Lukas breathing for a while, tries to drift off to the way his chest rises and falls. Every one of his breaths feels like a miracle, and even though Philip feels like sort of a creep laying there staring at Lukas’s peaceful face, it makes him get up, grab his notebook and head to the living room. He curls up under Helen’s new tapestry blanket and tries to arrange all his mushy thoughts. He doesn’t know how he survives sometimes with all this mush in his head. He didn’t know one single person could be _this_ mushy over another person.

But whenever he thinks about Lukas there are literal hearts in his eyes.

Lukas, with that hair, how he rakes his hand through it when he’s trying to be cool. That little half smile that grows when he looks at Philip for too long. 

Lukas, that’s saved Philip in more ways than one. Lukas, whose first thought after coming out of a coma was Philip’s safety.

Lukas, who came out for him. 

Lukas, who is the sunshine in every day. 

Lukas, who loves him. Who really, really loves him.

Philip smiles to himself and starts to write.

~  
~

Lukas wakes up briefly at like three in the morning. He groans a little bit, reaching out and trying to draw Philip closer, but he’s only met with an empty bed, the sheets thrown back where Philip is supposed to be. Lukas feels dizzy with sleep, his whole body heavy, but he blinks at the closed door and wonders if he should get up and look around. His paranoia still looms large behind his eyes with every minute they’re apart, and he tries to tell himself to chill out. They’re in Helen’s house. Philip’s fine. He’s gotta be somewhere. 

Lukas shifts onto his side and closes his eyes. Opens them again. Closes them, opens them again. 

He sighs.

He doesn’t know how much time has passed when the bed dips a little bit and Philip scoots back into his arms. Lukas lets out a breath and instantly relaxes, bringing home closer.

“Where’d you go?” he mutters into Philip’s ear, his voice rough. “Bathroom troubles?”

Philip laughs, his body shaking with it. “Shut up.”

“Guess so,” Lukas says, nuzzling into his neck and already drifting again. 

“Go back to sleep.”

“Mmm, yes sir,” Lukas says, everything getting heavier again, but somehow so much lighter now that Philip is back.

~

He wakes up again around nine and Philip is still sleeping. Lukas can hear Helen and Gabe downstairs, plates clinking in the kitchen, and he wonders how long they have to relax before they have to get up. He wonders if they’ve got anything else planned for today, or if the whole day is gonna be dedicated to preparing for the rehearsal dinner.

He looks over at Philip. His eyelids are fluttering like he’s in the middle of a dream, but not a bad one. His hands are tucked under his cheek and his mouth is open, his breathing deep. Lukas finds himself smiling, full of pride and happiness and every kind of joy living with Philip provides. When he was little marriage felt scary, like something he’d be forced into, a lace curtain he’d be suffocated under. It only got worse as he went through middle school, and whenever little girls would talk about it he’d try to change the subject. It scared him when they’d get too close to him, like one of them would instantly fall in love with him and he’d have to marry her (he really didn’t get how things worked, back then). He tried to keep his distance, tried to play it cool. 

Because marriage was the worst kind of thing he could think of. Nothing was scarier. Nothing made less sense. It felt like a duty, something he was tumbling headlong into, something he’d share with someone he didn’t really love. Because no one would know the secret he’d slowly been realizing he had. The secret he swallowed down, pummeled deep, tried to forget. Because he’d never let anybody know. Because he couldn’t survive anybody knowing.

But now he’s married. When he thinks about it he thinks of Philip in his arms, a Vegas hotel room, cherry flavor, their song. And lots of alcohol. Lots and lots and lots. But it’s not what he thought, not what he ever thought. He never thought he’d have two weddings with the same person. Never thought he’d be allowed to marry a boy. Never thought he’d allow himself something like that. 

He thinks it all the time, but Philip really did change his life. He tore a hole in the world and let the sunshine in. Lukas wonders, a lot, if he’s some sort of angel, if he’s the fate that God sent Lukas’s way to make him realize and accept who he really was. Philip is too perfect, too precious, and Lukas knows he’s gonna spend his entire goddamn life trying to make him smile.

Philip makes a little noise and shifts closer, his brows furrowing. Lukas reaches out and runs his hand through his hair gently, and Philip’s breath evens out again.

This seems like the perfect time, with the perfect inspiration, to write his vows. He grabs his phone off the bedside table, trying not to move the bed too much, and opens up his notepad app.

_I never knew I’d be able to have the life I wanted. Not until I saw you three aisles away from me in the drug store._

~

They leave the dogs to play with Helen and Gabe after breakfast and head out to get some champagne, extra salt and butter, since Helen doesn’t think they have enough. 

“You think they’ll ever get a dog?” Lukas asks, from the passenger seat. “I feel like they’re gonna try to steal our dogs if we keep bringing them around.”

Philip laughs. “Gabe has so many dogs in and out of there that I don’t think they’ve really thought about getting one for a pet.”

“Well they should,” Lukas says, watching as Philip pulls into the market’s parking lot. “Izzy and Sam need more friends.”

“They’ve got all their friends in the mirrors,” Philip says, putting the car into park and smiling over at Lukas. “Those twin dogs’ll keep them occupied for hours.”

Lukas laughs, grabbing Philip’s face and leaning in to kiss him. 

They’ve visited here a lot since they moved away, but usually they stay on the farms, occasionally going out to some restaurant but never really spending too much time in town. A lot of Tivoli reminds Lukas of bad things, the worry and fear creeping up his neck when he moves the wrong way or looks down an unfamiliar road. But there are good memories here too, and for some reason, shopping for groceries with Philip here delights him, fills him with a certain kind of pride. He wants to see people, wants people to see them together. Wants them to see that none of the shitty things they said or did meant anything. That none of the awful things that they went through stopped them. That they found happiness and normalcy anyway.

“I think we should buy other things,” Lukas says, grabbing a cart.

Philip gives him a look, moving away from the pile of baskets. “Like?”

“I don’t know,” Lukas says, grabbing a bag of rolls from a display near the registers. “Just like, other things. More food.”

Philip snorts, walking beside him. “You getting sentimental about grocery shopping? You know we do it all the time when we’re at home, right?”

Lukas nudges into him a little bit, smiling to himself. They walk through the flower section and Lukas grabs a couple of bouquets, Philip watching him silently. They get some snacks, some cheese, the things they were sent here to get, and when they move into the cereal aisle they nearly collide with Rose and her boyfriend.

“Oh hey!” she says, surprise in her eyes. “I didn’t expect to see you guys around town today, I thought you’d kinda be like…hanging out, getting ready, relaxing.”

“We had to grab a couple things and then Lukas wanted to go full-out shopping,” Philip says. 

“We got our outfits all laid out,” her boyfriend, Michael, says. His eyes are wide and there’s a sort of crazy smile on his face. “We’re really, really amped. Really excited for this party.”

“That’s awesome, dude,” Lukas says, feeling Philip go a little tense beside him. “We’re excited to have you guys—”

“I mean, you guys are too cool,” Michael says, gesturing towards them and letting his hands slap down against his legs. “Like. With everything you’ve gone through, it’s just like, awesome you’re together and you made it and all that.”

Lukas feels like he’s starting to sweat and he sees Rose make a weird face.

“Hey, babe, can you go grab that granola I like?” she asks, looking at her boyfriend. “I never know where it is.”

“Yeah,” he says, smiling at her. He looks at Lukas and Philip again, nodding at them. “See you tomorrow!”

Philip smiles a little at Lukas, his expression conveying everything Lukas is thinking, and Rose watches Michael go. She turns back to them with a sigh. “I’m sorry,” she says. “He’s been like, working on tolerance and acceptance and it’s sorta becoming this weird over the top thing.”

“Has he had a problem with it before?” Lukas asks.

“I mean, not necessarily,” Rose says, shrugging. “He just hasn’t…interacted with a whole ton of gay people and I told him he needed to be normal if he wanted to come to your wedding with me. And I guess this is his definition of normal. Aka incredibly awkward.”

“He wasn’t too bad,” Philip says, leaning into Lukas a little bit, one hand on their cart.

“Yeah, still a little overzealous,” Rose says, rolling her eyes. “Well, I’ll catch you guys tomorrow, I’ll be there taking a bunch of pictures.” She winks at them and squeezes Philip’s shoulder as she walks by.

“See you there!”

“Can’t wait!”

They keep walking down the aisle and Lukas looks down at Philip. He doesn’t miss dating Rose. He wishes they hung out with her more, yeah, but he definitely prefers sharing his life with someone who knows all he is and loves him anyway. 

“I’m glad that most people in the city are pretty chill,” Lukas says. “They’re used to gay people, we’re commonplace.”

“Yup,” Philip says, looking up at him. “I’m glad we live there.”

“Me too,” Lukas says, turning the corner.

~

They grab ice cream bars out of the cooler, pay for everything, and start heading back to the car. Once they get outside Lukas sees the group of guys he used to hang out with, across the street at the coffee house. They don’t see him and Philip doesn’t seem to notice them either, licking at the vanilla ice cream and popping the trunk so they can start loading up the groceries. Lukas starts to help, absentmindedly thinking about his time with them and who he was then. He wasn’t himself, he was a put-on, a false face, and most of them rejected him when he came out, stepping back and moving away like he was something to be avoided. Something disgusting.

Philip stood strong under incredible pressure. Before they got together Lukas treated him like utter shit, but Philip never let him go. Philip kept trying for him, gave him the benefit of the doubt no matter fucking what. And after they got together, Philip dealt with shit from everybody and never bit back, despite what he was going through. Because he’s good, because he’s fucking amazing.

Lukas doesn’t miss them.

He finishes loading up the trunk and Philip closes it, turning to him. He moves in and presses his lips to the corner of Lukas’s mouth, his tongue flicking out over the skin. He steps back, smiling, licking his lips.

“You had a little chocolate there,” he says, taking a bite of his own ice cream.

“Baby, I was saving that for later,” Lukas chides, grinning at him. 

“Don’t worry,” Philip says, walking over to the driver’s side. “We’ll have plenty of cake to share tomorrow.”

~

They get a couple texts from Angela, who’s coming up with Nathan, Simone and the kids, saying they’ll be there early in the morning. Lukas can feel the excitement rising in his veins, and he gets even more excited when they get back to the farm and start setting up for the rehearsal dinner. The dogs play in the living room with the seven new toys they’d gotten just for showing up, and they wander into the kitchen every couple of minutes for snacks before resuming their dog activities.

Gabe and Lukas are dealing with the meat for the tacos, Gabe on beef and Lukas on chicken, and Helen is in charge of the shells. Lukas keeps looking over at her, and one time she catches him, clicking her tongue and glaring.

“Stop side-eyeing me,” Helen says. “I am capable of taking care of taco shells.”

“She even made a spiked punch for us,” Gabe says, laughing. “Going all out.”

“It’s gonna be great,” Helen says, definitively.

“You sure?” Lukas asks, hearing Philip snort from the other side of the kitchen, where he’s cutting up lettuce and tomatoes, shredding cheese.

“The only reason I’m not kicking your ass, Waldenbeck, is because Morgan is coming today and I wanna seem amenable.”

They haven’t met Sarah’s daughter yet, and Lukas whips around and looks at Helen. “She’s actually coming? We never got the RSVP.”

“Yeah,” Gabe says. “She let us know last Monday so we made sure we had a spot for her tonight and tomorrow.”

“That’s awesome,” Philip says, and Lukas turns to see him smiling. “I’ve sorta been wondering why we haven’t met her yet.”

“She lives so far away, it’s hard to get back,” Helen says. 

“Is her girlfriend coming?” Lukas asks. 

“No, she couldn’t make it,” Helen says. “But I’m sure you’ll meet her one day, too. The three of them are probably on their way now, actually.”

“So we better hurry up,” Gabe says, grinning.

“I don’t know why we’re freaking out,” Philip says. “It’s not like this is the actual wedding, it’s just us, Morgan’s the only one that hasn’t been here before.”

“I want everything to be perfect,” Helen says, shrugging. 

“We’re keeping an eye on when the catering is getting here tomorrow, right?” Lukas asks, his mind racing through their list and trying to put the check marks in the right places.

“Of course,” Helen says, giving him a look. “Trust me, we’re on top of all of it. You don’t have to worry about anything.”

~

They’re setting up the taco bar outside under their tent, all the toppings set out in little bowls, and Philip keeps stepping back to take pictures of their progress. Lukas laughs, looking over his shoulder at him. 

“We’re never gonna get all this stuff out if you don’t chill with that,” he says.

“It’s just so cute and organized,” Philip says, taking another picture. He looks at Lukas over the top of his camera. “I’m excited to meet Morgan finally.”

“Yeah, me too,” Lukas says. “We definitely don’t hang out with enough gay people.”

Philip narrows his eyes, shaking his head at him. “We should text Zoe and Diana again, I guess.”

“Yeah,” Lukas says, laughing. “Well, they’ll be here tomorrow. We should set up a double date.”

“We should!” Philip says.

Lukas is so used to being gay that he doesn’t really consider it from an outside perspective anymore. He knows for a fact that people who don’t know him won’t think he’s gay on first glance, unless he’s holding Philip’s hand or literally kissing him. It’s strange to think of the divides, the big deal people make of it, the big deal he himself made of it. Everybody is the same. Everybody is human. It isn’t anybody’s fucking business who he loves, who anybody loves. 

“What?” Philip asks. “You’ve got that look.”

Lukas shakes his head, straightening out. “Nothing,” he says, approaching him, planting a big kiss on his lips.

“Hey, hey!” Dad’s voice says. “You guys gotta start preparing to be apart for the night, I don’t think it’s gonna be easy if you keep kissin’ on each other every five minutes.”

“Ugh,” Lukas groans, as he and Philip break apart. “Seriously, I don’t even wanna think about that until I absolutely have to. You sure you guys don’t wanna change your minds?”

“Yeah, we wouldn’t mind,” Philip says.

Lukas sees Dad, Sarah and Morgan coming outside holding more plates. Dad shakes his head, approaching them. “Nope, we gotta keep that tradition,” he says. “It’ll make it nicer, when you see each other again the next day.”

“Wow, you actually remembered to bring the coleslaw,” Philip says, grinning at Dad.

“I forget one time and you never let me live it down,” Dad says, grinning right back at him.

“Boys, this is my daughter, Morgan,” Sarah says, sashaying over and presenting her with the kind of pride Lukas has been seeing more and more from his own father lately. Morgan wears glasses, has short blonde hair and smiles the same way that Sarah does, with her whole body. She holds out her arms and pulls them both into a hug at the same time.

“So, so sorry I haven’t met you guys yet,” she says, pulling back but still holding onto their shoulders. “But I assure you, I know enough about your relationship to write a book about it.”

Dad leans away from them and clears his throat, not making eye contact.

“I’m not surprised,” Lukas says, laughing. “But thank you,” he says, quieter, leaning towards her a little bit. “I think you’ve definitely…made a difference.”

“Absolutely,” Philip says, nodding at her. “You and Sarah definitely helped change his perspective on things.”

“Well, I’m happy to help, even though I have no idea what I really did,” she says, shrugging. “I was just…myself, you know? I guess he needed to see it from a different point of view and in a different situation. Made things clearer. What really matters, what’s important.”

“I guess so,” Lukas says, a chill of warmth running through his heart.

“Okay, boys,” Gabe says, coming out with the taco shells on a big tray. “Let’s go over the ceremony so we can get to eating.”

“C’mon, Mor,” Sarah says, tugging on her arm. “Let’s go get the dogs.”

Morgan grins and raises her eyebrows at them, following her mother.

Lukas looks at Philip, who’s already looking at him. “Let’s go, uh—practice getting married,” Lukas says, his mouth pinched as he tries not to smile.

“Yeah,” Philip says, his eyes bright. “Let’s…let’s do that.”

~

They didn’t really talk about this. Not extensively. They just knew that they wanted to walk down the aisle together, Helen standing on Philip’s side and Dad standing on Lukas’s. But they stand at the end of the aisle in the barn, waiting for Helen and Dad to go, and Lukas grips Philip’s hand tight. Sarah stands a little to the side, holding Izzy and Samson by their leashes. 

“We didn’t even think about music for this,” Lukas says, his heart picking up its pace. He feels like he’s getting a headache.

“Yeah,” Philip trails off. “We pretty much only thought of the first dance.”

Helen and Dad turn around to look at them, their brows furrowed.

“We’re not gonna do—” Dad starts, but Lukas scoffs.

“We’re not gonna do here comes the bride, dad,” Lukas says, widening his eyes at him. He sees Helen suppress a smile and Philip does the same.

“I’ve got a lot of nice instrumental music on my phone,” Helen says, pulling it out of her pocket. “Because I may or may not have anticipated you’d forget about this part.”

Philip huffs at her. “Like what?”

“A bunch if Vitamin String Quartet stuff, they do versions of new songs too. Here.” She hands her phone over and Philip takes it, holding it between them. Philip opens up iTunes and starts scrolling through her music, and Lukas is trying not to panic, trying not to picture a future where they never find a song. He knows that’s ridiculous, but he focuses really hard on the list that Philip is scrolling through just in case. 

“Oh,” Lukas says, and it feels like the wind is knocked out of him.

“What?” Philip asks, looking back and forth between Lukas and the phone.

“That Elvis song,” Lukas says, gesturing with his chin. “We danced to that—in the hotel after prom. When we were all wet.”

Dad clears his throat again.

“Can’t help falling in love?” Helen asks, and she sounds excited. “Really?”

“Good?” Lukas asks.

“I mean, I love that song,” Helen says. She seems very young in that moment, chewing on her lower lip and looking at Philip. “But it’s up to you two.”

“Elvis,” Philip says, meeting Lukas’s eyes, and there’s something sly there. Like he’s implying something secret about Vegas, how they really could have had an Elvis impersonator marry them if they had gone two churches over. Lukas’s heart beats even faster. “Swanky,” Philip says. 

Helen reaches over and presses play on the song. They all stand there and listen for a few moments. Lukas is transported back to that moment in the hotel room after prom, how they peeled each other’s clothes off, how they could barely stop kissing. Swaying back and forth in the middle of the room to that song, and it felt like romance, the kind of romance he’d always wanted to give Philip but he’d been too afraid to try. The instrumental version is really nice, and he can picture them all walking to it. It feels right.

“Yeah, I like it,” Lukas says.

“Like?” Philip asks.

“Love, sleepy jean,” Lukas says, swiping his thumb across the curve of Philip’s smile.

“DJ knows to play that one,” Philip says, beaming.

Philip hands Helen her phone back and she looks triumphant as she stops the music. “Okay, so we’ll play that over our speakers—Sarah, you can start it?”

“Yes,” Sarah says, nodding, reaching down and patting Izzy on the head when she starts whining. 

“So I’ll go first,” Helen says. “Gabe’ll already be up there to begin with. Then Bo after me. Then the boys.”

“Okay,” Philip says, and he looks a little nervous, like he’s concentrating on a particularly hard problem in class. Lukas squeezes his hand. He wishes they hadn’t been so fucking drunk for their first wedding so they could remember what to do and this wouldn’t be so nerve wracking. The video doesn’t do it any justice or help at all—they’ve only watched it twice more since the first time, and it really does feel like watching other random people, not themselves. That’s how fucking drunk they were. So drunk that they were shadows of themselves, weird, drunk alternate versions. 

But if they weren’t drunk it wouldn’t have happened to begin with. Lukas sighs. 

“When do the dogs do their thing?” he asks.

“Well, I figured Gabe would do his whole bit, then you guys would do your vows, and then at the rings part Gabe would ask for the rings and then Sarah would come down with the dogs.”

Philip snorts, shaking his head.

“What?” Lukas asks, smiling.

“It’s just gonna be fucking cute,” Philip says, covering his mouth. Helen gives him a look and he shakes his head. “Sorry, just—really, really cute.”

“I’m sure,” Helen says. She looks at Dad.

“Then Sarah can take the dogs aside—they can sit, right?” Dad asks.

Lukas laughs. “Uh, sometimes.”

“If they don’t just rein them in and keep them close,” Philip says, looking at Sarah.

“Oh, I’m sure I’ll be able to manage that,” Sarah says, rubbing on both dogs and making them dance.

“Then I’ll finish it off,” Gabe says. “You’ll exchange rings, do the last bit of the vows where I pronounce you married, you’ll kiss, and we’re done!”

“Done!” Lukas says, bringing Philip’s hand up to his mouth and kissing it. 

“Okay,” Philip says, in a rush of breath. “Let’s rehearse this thing.”

~

They do it four different times before they feel good about it. The dogs actually act like normal dogs instead of their regular insane selves, and Lukas thinks they might be able to make it down the aisle without dumping the rings off the pillows strapped to their backs. He wonders if they’re the crazy dog people for including their dogs in their wedding, but he doesn’t think he’d want it any other way. They don’t say their whole vows as not to spoil them, but Gabe is professional as hell and Lukas is so, so happy. He stands there, holding Philip’s hands and gazing into his eyes, and he feels like his face is gonna split from smiling so hard. He knows it’ll definitely be harder to do all this once the barn is full of people and he actually has to read out the sentimental shit he put into his vows, but for now he just enjoys how cute Philip is and how happy they both are. 

When they’re done they move to the back yard, where the reception is going to be tomorrow, and start in on their rehearsal dinner. The tacos are good. The bar was a great idea. And Helen’s punch is ridiculously, ridiculously alcoholic. Spiked isn’t the right word. It feels like he’s chugging a bottle of vodka. He has two glasses of it and sorta feels like he’s gonna die.

He shudders over to Helen, who’s pouring herself another glass of it. The remains of the taco bar are truly torn up, because the drunker they got, the more they wanted to eat, and the more they ate like rabid animals. The tacos were really good. All the sides were really good too. Everything was awesome. But the punch. The goddamn punch.

Helen looks up, grinning at him.

“Do you realize that…this is poison?” Lukas says, swaying a little bit and pointing at the still-pretty-full punch bowl. He isn’t completely drunk yet but he can feel himself hurdling towards it, and every time he hears Philip laugh he knows he’s already there.

“I may have—failed a little,” Helen says. “I tried to, uh—double the recipe, so I’d have…enough—you know, enough for everybody.”

Lukas scoffs, looking down into his cup as she ladles more into it. “Uh—the fuck.”

“Lukas.”

“The hell—enough? Helen, that bowl is like—the sea.”

She looks at him and narrows her eyes, laughing. “The sea?”

“Big enough to be the sea—you know what I mean, like—large, this is a large bowl.”

He tunes in to the table again. Dad is regaling some story about a hunting trip that Lukas has only heard a couple times in his lifetime, but Dad is being like, really, really loud. Philip is laughing and that seems to egg Dad on, and for a minute Lukas gets caught up staring at how cute that is. He wanders back over, the grass soft under his feet, and he can’t remember when the hell he took off his shoes. He sits back down just as everybody erupts into laughter. 

Dad leans in and whispers into Lukas’s ear. “Are you having a good time?” he asks, and his breath smells like actual shit.

“Well,” Lukas says, his vision wavering. He can sorta hear Morgan and Helen talking about something, sounds like something about a bank or the government, he has no idea. He tries to stop focusing on them and focus on his dad, but then Philip puts his hand on Lukas’s thigh and Lukas sighs. “Well,” Lukas says again, looking briefly at Philip, who isn’t even looking at him, being effortlessly sexy as per fucking usual. “Uh—yes. Except we’re all getting drunk and I’m getting married tomorrow and I don’t—wanna have a hangover.” He hiccups. He isn’t gonna have another drink. He can see and remember right now even though he’s teetering on the edge, and he wants to keep it that way. No, he wants to—stop and move away from the edge. Definitely not fall over the edge.

“They’ve got some of that—that drink inside.”

“Another drink?” Lukas hisses, looking at him.

Dad actually laughs at him. “Uh—Pedialyte. The electrolyte drink for babies.”

Lukas stares at him. “Why do you have a baby drink?”

“Helen figured out it helps with hangovers,” Dad says, shrugging. “To be honest, I haven’t—when you left home, I tried to—stop drinking altogether. I knew it was like, a thing for me, an issue, a problem. I went to—meetings, and things, talked to Helen and Gabe about it, Sarah also helped, but I was already doing pretty good once I met—once I met her—this is the most I’ve had since you lived here. Since your—junior year.” His cheeks are really red and he nods. “I’ve had the occasional drink but I’ve been—I’ve been doing really good. A lot better.”

Lukas feels all that in his chest and it makes him nervous and sad and happy all at the same time. “No more drinks for you tonight, okay?” 

“Yeah,” Dad says, nodding. “I’m pretty—I’m pretty done.”

“Yeah, you look it.” Lukas’s vision is hazy but he can definitely see how red Dad’s eyes are.

“Well, let’s just drink the champagne before we cut ourselves off,” Dad says.

“Yeah,” Gabe says, coughing a little bit. “Yeah, Helen, you might have made this punch uh—”

“Poison,” Philip says.

“Hey,” Lukas says, reaching up and palming the back of Philip’s neck. “That’s the word I used.”

Philip turns and beams at him.

“I haven’t drank anything this strong since before Shelley and I started dating,” Morgan says, and she laughs loudly, unlike Lukas has heard so far. 

“It’s fine,” Helen says, drawing out the word. “Fine, fine, fine. We’re done! Just champagne, dessert, then we’ll—drink lots of water and watch TV, since—driving home is a thing, for some of us.”

“And Lukas has to come home with us,” Sarah says, loudly. “Keep ‘em separate for the night.”

“Ugh,” Lukas groans, leaning into Philip, who scoots closer to him. “I hate thinking about it. I don’t wanna think about it.”

“I mean—we’ve got the couch,” Gabe says, throwing up his hands. Lukas tries not to laugh. “And the other room—we’ve—space, we have it! We’ve got space.”

“Okay,” Dad says, as if he wasn’t listening at all. He wavers to his feet and grabs the champagne bottle, nodding to the table.

“Bo, you’re drunk,” Sarah says, and then she starts snickering, leaning in towards Helen like the two of them are sharing a secret. 

“Yes,” Dad says, and Lukas covers his face with his hand. He already feels like he’s getting a headache, and he knows he’s gotta go get whatever magic baby drink they’ve got inside and chug it so he won’t fuck up another wedding. He feels Philip lean in and kiss him on the cheek, resting his head on his shoulder. 

“I’d like to dedicate this bottle to the healthy couple,” Dad says. “Happy. Happy couple. And I’m gonna dedicate it with a trick your mother taught me, Lukas, one that she could do every damn time she tried it but I had to practice for months with a butter knife.”

“Wait,” Lukas says, his brain trying to catch up with the words. “Knife.”

“Bo, you’re drunk,” Sarah says, laughing again.

Lukas watches him grab the nearest steak knife and position the bottle against his stomach. Lukas feels so drunk right now, like he’s watching some stupid movie that he can’t decipher.

“Maybe let’s not,” Helen says. 

“No, I’ve got this,” Dad says, clearing his throat. “I’ve done it a hundred times.”

“Wait,” Lukas says, closing his eyes tight. “I think I’ve seen him do this before.” He cuts the fucking cap off the bottle. Without a bottle opener. One of those stupid college tricks that Mom learned in her sorority. He’s seen Dad do it a couple times, really clean and easy.

But he’s fucking drunk right now. So is everybody else. Everybody is drunk and now a knife is involved.

“Do what—” Philip starts.

But then everything goes in slow motion. In Lukas’s memories, hidden under a deep fog of Helen’s heinous punch, Dad is supposed to just swiftly slice the cap of the bottle off. But here and now, in the stilted air where all of their breath sticks, amidst halted questions about what the fuck he’s doing, Dad slides the knife along the neck of the bottle and stops right by his own thumb.

Except he doesn’t stop. Except now there’s blood.

Lukas isn’t sure if he’s hallucinating or not. They’re all frozen, Sarah’s hands over her mouth, Gabe’s eyes wide, Philip clinging to Lukas’s arm. 

Dad straight up cut into his finger. A deep wound, welling up with red, and the way the severed skin hangs there makes Lukas want to throw up and scream at the same time.

“Uh,” Dad grunts, simply, and Lukas is surprised there isn’t more horror in his eyes. Just confusion.

“Holy fuck,” Morgan says.

Helen isn’t saying anything which is almost the scariest part.

“Okay,” Gabe says, getting up, his chair literally toppling over into the grass and snow behind him. Lukas fucking forgot it was snowing. “Okay,” Gabe says again, holding out his hands in a gesture or to steady himself, Lukas can’t decide. He also realizes he can’t move either and he’s fucking frozen in fear. “Okay everybody.”

“Okay,” Helen says, finally, and when Lukas looks he sees her eyes are darting back and forth between Gabe and Dad.

“Okay,” Gabe says, pointedly at her.

“Okay,” Lukas says, jumping up fast.

Gabe meets his eyes. “We—just—need—to—stop—the—bleeding.”

He’s speaking like he’s just learned the English language but it drives the point home. Lukas grabs a napkin and Philip moves fast too, weaving around him and taking the bottle from Dad’s trembling hands. Lukas wraps the napkin around Dad’s injured finger, trying not to be too grossed out.

“Okay,” Helen says again. She gets up slowly and pats Sarah on the head, who is still sitting there with her hands over her mouth. Helen is still swaying and for a moment she looked like she had a plan but now she’s just standing there.

“Inside,” Philip says, grabbing onto Dad’s shoulder. 

“Okay,” Lukas says, and hisses at himself for saying it. It doesn’t even sound like a word anymore.

Dad looks back and forth between them as they huddle him inside the house, the dogs by the door curious and jumping. “That, uh….was not how that trick was supposed to go,” he says, as they step inside.

“Yeah,” Lukas says, watching as the blood seeps through the napkin. “Kinda fucking figured.”

They stumble through the house into the downstairs bathroom and the way Philip shuts the door reverberates through Lukas’s brain. He wants to be not drunk. He wants to be immediately not drunk. 

“Okay, I don’t—I do not wanna look at your hand,” Lukas says, taking hold of his dad’s wrist and easing it under the faucet, quickly tossing the soiled napkin away.

“Good decision,” Dad says, swallowing hard. “It’s—it’s not good.”

Philip turns on the water to a slow drizzle and Lukas tries really really hard not to look at the destroyed skin, but he sees the steady stream of blood swirling down the drain.

“First aid,” Philip mutters, opening up the mirror cabinet. He grabs a few things, knocks a couple more things over and onto the ground, and keeps cursing at himself. Lukas doesn’t wanna laugh because he thinks he’s so damn cute, so he focuses on his dad and how gross and horrible all of this is. “Take this,” Philip says, handing Lukas another puffy towel, but this one is red.

“Red, good,” Lukas says, turning off the tap and wrapping the towel around dad’s finger. “You won’t even be able to see the blood.”

“Firm—firm pressure,” Philip says, sniffling and staring intently down at their work.

Lukas holds on firmly. 

Dad sighs, shaking his head, and clears his throat again. “I’m sorry, boys,” he says. 

“It’s okay,” Philip says, fast. “It was—it was an accident.”

“This is the last thing I wanted to do,” Dad says, and when Lukas looks up at his face he looks positively beat down. Lukas blinks a few times to try and stay in the moment. He’s in the middle of panic and drunkenness and it’s doing weird things to his body. Dad shakes his head again. “Listen, I’m—I’m so sorry for how I acted.”

“When?” Lukas asks, reeling back a little bit and trying not to topple to the fucking ground and splash into the toilet. “Tonight?”

“No,” Dad says. “In the beginning.”

Lukas has a hard time thinking about the beginning when he’s drunk. Any of it. Those old feelings try to climb through time and sink their claws into him. “We’ve been through this,” Lukas says. “It’s okay.”

“I’m just a stubborn man,” Dad says, and Lukas feels like he’s holding his finger tighter. “I was just—it was shock, defensive—I didn’t know, I didn’t understand, it didn’t make sense to me.”

“It’s okay, Bo,” Philip says. 

Dad shakes his head. “No, it’s just—ignorance, the ignorance of my generation—but your mother was different, Lukas, she was—she was good, accepting, and I should have thought about how she would have felt, how she would have reacted—that was my biggest mistake. She would have loved you, Philip—you—she would have loved you, because you were giving Lukas that—the opportunity to be himself. And out, a doorway to—the life he wasn’t allowing himself to lead. The life, the real personality that—that he really was, that I wasn’t—that I wasn’t accepting of. That I couldn’t see.”

Lukas’s whole brain is crying and he expects his face to start crying too. He holds onto the towel tighter and he’s afraid he’s gonna pull his dad’s finger off. 

“I’m just—I’m good now, I’m good, I’m a slow learner and adapter and I’m there now,” Dad says, nodding. “I’ve got two sons now—”

Well, that fucking does it, and Lukas sobs like a little child, leaning forward and resting his forehead on Dad’s shoulder. 

Philip sounds a lot happier, laughing. “You didn’t have to try and cut off your finger to tell us that,” he says.

“It was always such a good party trick,” Dad says. “But anyway—I’m so happy for you, I swear I am, I’m so, so glad and I hope—I really hope you have a wonderful time in the Grand Canyon.”

“We will,” Philip says. “Definitely.”

Lukas wipes at his eyes with his free hand and peels the towel back to look at the wound. He nearly pukes, but it’s not bleeding anymore. “Let’s uh, wash this out,” he says, turning on the tap again. 

There’s a knock at the door, and the doorknob rattles. “You guys okay?” Helen’s voice asks. “Should we—hospital?”

“No,” Dad and Lukas say at the same time.

The door knob rattles again. “Why can’t we get in there?” Sarah asks.

“Did you lock the door?” Lukas asks, looking at Philip.

Philip just shrugs, making a face. The door knob rattles again.

A smile tugs at Lukas’s lips. “Why?” he asks. 

A little line of concern presents itself between Philip’s eyes and he almost looks like he’s gonna start crying, shaking his head again. 

“So fucking cute,” Lukas says, grinning at him. He sighs, turning off the water. “Okay, let’s put—some fucking antibacterial shit on this and wrap it up and pretend it never happened.”

~  
~

It doesn’t take Philip long to sober up, once they deal with Bo’s injury and hear his heartfelt confessions. It always thrills Philip to hear Bo say shit like that, and he thanks God and whoever is listening for the trails they’ve blazed getting here. They all sit around and drink that electrolyte drink, watch some special on penguins, and then around eleven everybody starts getting ready to go.

After Lukas takes about ten minutes saying goodbye to the dogs, he pulls Philip off into his bedroom. He gathers him up into his arms and Philip nuzzles into his neck, clinging to him like he isn’t gonna see him for a year. 

“So…I’ll be back tomorrow,” Lukas says. “Probably super early to have breakfast.”

“I don’t know if they’re gonna try to prevent that,” Philip says, breathing him in. “They might try to pull that whole ‘don’t let them see each other til they walk down the aisle’ bullshit.”

“Yeah, no,” Lukas says, pulling back. He cups Philip’s face in his hands and kisses him. Philip presses into him, tries to determine if they have time to do anything before the others come calling. But he figures they’ll have all the time in the world tomorrow. After they’re officially married. Lukas sighs, pulling back, rubbing his thumb back and forth across Philip’s cheek. “This is so dumb.”

“So dumb.”

“My dad literally just sliced his finger open, he shouldn’t be able to dictate this kind of crap to us.”

Philip snorts. “I think they’re just trying to be cute and traditional.”

“It’s just irritating and hurtful to my mental health,” Lukas says, and he kisses him again. They sway against each other, their lips sliding together.

“We got this,” Philip says. 

Lukas nudges his nose into Philip’s. “Ugh. I told you I didn’t wanna be away from you ever again. Not for one night, not for one second.”

Philip dips his head down, pressing forward into Lukas’s chest. He still makes him blush, still makes his stomach flip with how fucking sweet and romantic he can be. “Well, you can dream of me,” he says, leaning in and kissing Lukas’s neck. “And then tomorrow we can get married again. A wedding we’ll actually remember.”

“Yeah, thank god we drank that baby juice.”

Philip snorts again, looking at him. “Pedialyte.”

“Whatever,” Lukas says, shrugging.

Philip kisses him hard. “Okay, go, so we can get this night over with.”

“I’ll text you when I’m going to bed,” Lukas says, and he kisses him again.

~

Philip is usually with Lukas when he’s sleeping here, so he’s normally distracted. But now he can’t sleep, the mixture of loneliness and excitement boiling over and keeping him up. He sits on the edge of the bed, rummaging through his bedside table. He finds a pile of Polaroids from high school. He remembers the day—he’d been sitting on the bleachers by the football field waiting for Lukas. There are a few of the football players practicing, a bouquet of flowers abandoned a couple of stairs away from him, a squirrel in the nearest tree, and then Lukas. Lukas, Lukas, Lukas. The last one is a really fucking cute one of Lukas kissing Philip’s cheek and Philip is annoyed he left it here. He takes the whole stack and tosses it into his suitcase. 

He finds his mom’s sun and star necklace in the drawer too, lets it pool in the palm of his hand. He stares at it in the gold gleam of his light and swallows hard. It still feels off kilter when he thinks about the world without her, when the realization hits for the thousandth time that he is an orphan, for all intents and purposes. His father never knew him. Never will know him. And his mother, and all her vivid energy, is gone forever. He doesn’t like remembering it. He doesn’t like letting it hit him. But it’ll never not be true.

He sighs. Lukas already went to bed a little bit ago but Philip really wishes he hadn’t. He puts the necklace on the bedside table and flips off the light, grabbing his phone and twisting onto his side under the covers. 

_Lol why did we allow this to happen_ he texts to Lukas. He knows Lukas is a part of him now, as much as his arms are a part of him, or his lungs or his heart. They’re connected on a different plane of existence, something Philip didn’t know was possible. He knows they can be apart, that they’re totally capable of doing it. They have in the past and they got through it. But fuck, it sure does take the wind of out their sails when it happens. Philip is glad he isn’t alone in feeling this way. People could call them codependent, and sometimes they call themselves that, but Philip knows functioning without Lukas for an extended period of time is just something that doesn’t interest him. The world doesn’t have as much color when Lukas isn’t nearby. Philip doesn’t feel as safe, or nearly as alive.

His phone buzzes in his hand and startles him out of his thoughts. A message from Lukas. Philip quickly opens it. _Maybe you should look out the window?_

Philip narrows his eyes and looks over his shoulder. Everything seems calm, and he wonders if Lukas left something cute outside in the snow or something. He puts his phone down among the sheets and flips the blanket off his shoulder, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed. He turns on the light again, pads over to the window and opens the curtains, and nearly has a fucking heart attack when Lukas is literally right the fuck there. He stumbles back, his hand over his chest, and Lukas grins, tapping on the window. Philip lets out a breath, trying to think straight again, and steps forward, opening the window. 

“What the hell are you doing?” Philip whispers. He peers down over the ledge and sees Lukas is standing on Gabe’s big ass ladder. 

“Yeah, this is really lame, but I just couldn’t do it,” Lukas says, pressing his lips together in a thin line and shaking his head. “I was laying there and feeling really weird and I just—took my bike and rode over here.”

Philip laughs, smiling. “Your rusty old bike?”

“Yep,” Lukas says. “A very bumpy and long ride, but it’s worth it now.”

Philip shakes his head, but he can’t stop smiling. “Get in here,” he says. “It must be cold as hell.” He braces his hands under Lukas’s arms and hauls him inside, making sure they don’t rattle the ladder and make it fall in the process. Once he’s inside Lukas closes the window and locks it, turning back around and drawing Philip into his arms. Philip wipes the snow off him, ruffling it out of Lukas’s hair. They just stare at each other for a couple seconds, smiling. 

“We are ridiculous,” Philip says. 

“Yeah.”

“I was just missing you,” Philip says. “Really really missing you.”

“It just feels really stupid to be sleeping apart when we don’t have to,” Lukas says, shrugging. 

“They’re probably gonna be pissy about it,” Philip says. 

“Oh well,” Lukas says, like he doesn’t care at all.

“How’s your dad?” Philip asks, searching Lukas’s face.

“Fine,” Lukas says, embarrassment shining in his eyes. “Says it hurts a lot more now that he’s not drunk. But Sarah finally came out of her stupor and started dealing with him. Morgan couldn’t stop laughing.”

“I like her,” Philip says. 

“Me too.”

“So he doesn’t have to go to the hospital?”

“Nah,” Lukas says, shaking his head. “If it stays like it is now it’s just gross looking, but it should heal up.”

“Good,” Philip says. He looks at him, stroking his face, and feels really dramatic about not wanting to deal with one night apart. “You know you have to go back there before the wedding, because you brought all your shit over there.”

“Yeah,” Lukas says. “Doesn’t matter. I’m here now.”

Philip feels a lot warmer now. Safer. Like Lukas creates this protective bubble around him that blocks out all the pain, the thoughts that crop up that Philip would rather keep hidden. “C’mon,” he says, tugging on Lukas’s hand. “Bed.”

“Mmm, good,” Lukas says, following him. Philip climbs back in and shifts over towards his side of the bed, and Lukas pulls off his jeans, tossing them aside. He flips off the light and slides over closer in the darkness, pressing their bodies together and draping one of Philip’s legs over his hip.

Philip doesn’t waste time, moving in and kissing him. He tastes like the toothpaste they use at his dad’s house when they stay there, and Philip works his arm around, tangling his fingers in Lukas’s hair. 

“Is it like…a thing that you’re…not supposed to do anything sexy the night before your wedding?”

“If it is I don’t care,” Philip whispers, kissing him again. “Who makes rules?” he mutters, licking along Lukas’s lower lip. “Rules are stupid.” He ruts against him, his eyelids fluttering at the friction. “You know what really annoys me?” he asks.

“What?” Lukas says, soft.

“That your belly button is pierced and you never wear anything in it anymore,” Philip says. 

Lukas groans. “I so do. I mean—yeah, I totally have a couple times, and those are all times when you literally asked me to.”

Philip smiles. “Okay, then I ask you to…all the time.”

“You’re the worst,” Lukas says, shaking his head at him.

“But you love me,” Philip says.

Lukas laughs and turns fond, leaning in and pressing a long kiss to Philip’s cheek. “Yeah, I do,” he says, quietly. He moves to his forehead next and Philip sighs, melting into him.

“Do you ever get worried about our future?” Philip asks, close to Lukas’s neck. 

“No,” Lukas says. “Not anymore.”

Philip moves back a little bit so he can look him in the eye. The darkness is thick but he could find the outline of Lukas anywhere. “Not at all?” he asks.

Lukas shakes his head. “Not since high school, not really,” he says. “It feels even easier now that we’re done with college. It’s just—once we tore all the walls in my head down, you and me felt like the easiest thing. The thing I was supposed to be aiming for all along. The whole world could be falling apart but if you were still there—I know I could make it.”

Philip stares at him, stars in his eyes and music in his heart. “I swear to God, how much do you practice these speeches before you try them out on me?”

Lukas scoffs, pinching Philip’s middle and making him squirm. 

“Stop,” Philip laughs, leaning in and muffling himself against Lukas’s shoulder.

“You can ruin every moment,” Lukas says, still tickling him, the both of them moving against each other and jolting back and forth. “Every single one.”

“Stop, stop,” Philip says, reaching up and grabbing Lukas’s face. He kisses him hard, deep, and eventually Lukas’s hands stop poking and wrap around Philip’s waist instead, drawing him closer.

~

Philip is woken up by Helen’s voice.

“Yeah, he’s here,” she says, with a heavy sigh.

Philip pops one eye open and sees her standing in the doorway, her phone held to her ear. He’s half on top of Lukas and they’re also half naked, though thankfully they’re both mostly covered. He’s too tired to do much more than smile, and Lukas is snoring loudly.

“No idea,” Helen says, frustration in her eyes, still honed in on them. “Front door was locked—I’m guessing he took the ladder and climbed in through the window.” She cocks her head at Philip and he nods at her. She rolls her eyes. Lukas’s snoring gets a little quieter. “Yeah, I’ll make breakfast—”

Philip groans, closing his eye.

“Gabe will make breakfast,” she corrects, “and then I’ll send Lukas back your way to get ready.” She huffs at them again and walks out into the hallway just as Lukas starts stirring. She barely lets the door close.

Lukas hums a little bit, reaching up and brushing Philip’s hair back from his forehead. “Did she catch me?” 

“Yup,” Philip says, pressing a kiss to the core of Lukas’s chest and scooting up a bit to lay his head on his shoulder. 

“We haven’t been caught in a long time,” Lukas says, a devious smile on his face.

“Yeah,” Philip says. “The last time was pretty traumatizing.” It was one of the last days they were living at home before going to college, and Helen unceremoniously walked in on them touching each other. Thank God it was happening under the covers.

Lukas laughs a little bit, his eyes still closed. 

Philip rubs his hand up and down Lukas’s chest. “Hey,” he says, resting his chin on his fingers.

Lukas turns a little bit, opening his eyes. “Hey.”

“You wanna marry me today?” Philip asks, softly.

“Yes,” Lukas says, running the backs of his knuckles along Philip’s cheek. “Yes, I wanna marry you.”

“Again,” Philip laughs. 

“Shhh,” Lukas hushes, sitting up and kissing him. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

~

Lukas leaves after breakfast, which sucks, but it’s easer parting this morning because it feels like they’ve gotten away with something. They kiss until Helen and Gabe start catcalling, and then the dogs start howling and it becomes a whole big thing. But as soon as Lukas is gone, things start to feel real. The food gets delivered just as Philip heads upstairs to his room. He can see the big van through his window, the whole fleet of servers preparing things and keeping most of it ready for the reception.

Philip doesn’t drink anything, but he feels like he’s drunk. He feels like he loses the ability to measure time—it speeds up, people speaking like they’ve sucked in helium, there one minute and gone the next, a thousand missed text messages. But then it comes to a halt in strange, translucent moments, like he’s looking through a sheet and not through his own eyes. 

Helen pops her head in, and he has no idea how much time has passed since he came up here. “All the decorations are up, everything’s ready to go.”

“Flowers are here?” Philip asks, from his spot on the edge of his bed. He doesn’t know why he asks, he definitely saw the car get here a little while after the food came.

“Yeah, we took care of all that,” Helen says. “DJ’s here, he’s all ready, the photographer girl is downstairs eating a plate of cheese I made—”

Philip snorts, shaking his head. He can imagine what a Helen cheese plate looks like. A hunk of sharp cheddar, a couple slices of swiss. Maybe a couple curds of bleu cheese if she’s trying to be fancy. Jennifer is way too nice to judge or even say anything, but Philip knows she likes cheese, so he hopes she’s enjoying herself.

“Those guys are here setting up the hors d'oeuvres for when people start showing up—”

“Nobody’s here yet, right?” Philip asks, his heart hammering. 

“Not yet,” Helen says, smiling at him. “Sarah’s been practicing with the dogs and those fake rings from the store, I think they’re getting the hang of it.”

“Good,” Philip says, in a rush of breath. The checklist almost looks like a real piece of paper in his head and it presents itself in his mind. He doesn’t wanna be this dude, panicking. He needs to chill out. He takes a deep breath. It’s all gonna be fine. He’s totally done this before. He tries to wipe that thought away while Helen is close to him, though, just in case she’s become a mind reader and hasn’t told him.

“We put out your guest book,” Helen says. “With lots of love and care. So you don’t have to worry about that. In fact, kid, you don’t worry about anything. I can see it all over your face.”

Way too close to mind reading. “I’m fine,” Philip says, his voice breaking like he’s fucking fourteen years old. “Totally cool, it’s like nothing.”

Helen gives him a look and then she pushes the door open a little bit more. She’s already wearing her dress, a light green, and she looks so nice that he immediately brightens, grinning at her. He can’t find the words though, the words for her or how beautiful she is or for anything about this situation. 

She takes his face delicately in her hands and presses a long kiss to his forehead. “Everything is gonna be great,” she says, straightening back up and putting her hands on her hips. “You’re right, it’s totally cool.” She sounds a little funny echoing his phrase and he beams at her. “You guys are basically married already, anyways.”

He laughs awkwardly, the words sinking even deeper into his gut.

~

He’s glad they decided to forgo suits. He stares at himself in the mirror—he’s comfortable and he thinks he looks pretty good. Just a simple blue collared shirt, ironed a thousand times, khakis and the new boots Helen and Gabe bought him. 

He can hear people outside, Nathan’s laugh reverberating off the walls, and he also knows that Lukas snuck in the back way and is currently across the hall. Philip is glad they aren’t waiting to see each other, and as soon as Helen lets them know everybody is in the barn, they’re gonna come out. Morgan’s been sneaking snacks up to them, and Philip is really happy that they came out so goddamn good.

_Do you want a drink?_ Sarah texts him. _I know last night was ridiculous but I just wanted to check :)_

Philip smiles, shaking his head. _No, I’m okay :) I wanna remember everything!_ He almost types ‘I wanna remember this one’ and sends a jolt straight through his heart. He knows it’s all gonna go so fast and he tries not to lament the time he hasn’t even lived yet. 

He bows his head, looks at his watch. It’s getting really close to being time. He walks over and looks out the window. It’s bright but still cloudy, the snow light on the ground but not coming down anymore, at least not right now. They’ve been lucky as shit with this weather. It looks a lot like the photos Lukas would always show him, the kind of day he wanted. Philip can’t see any more people out there, and he figures they’re all in the barn. They’re actually in there.

Philip feels like his life has been sliced into segments. His mother. The murders. After. He never thought, with the trials and the pain, that his After could be like this.

There’s a knock on his door. 

“Come in,” Philip says, squeezing his phone in his hand. 

The door opens and it’s Lukas standing there. He’s got on a white suit jacket, a white undershirt and no tie, pants that match the jacket. They both just stand there staring at each other for a couple moments, and Philip feels like his breath is caught in his throat. 

“Hey,” Lukas says, his smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

“Hey,” Philip says back, and he doesn’t know why he’s fucking blushing, this is Lukas, his Lukas, the Lukas he wakes up with every morning and goes to bed with every night. Lukas, who knows everything about him and loves him anyway, every little jagged piece of him.

And maybe that’s why he’s blushing.

“You just—you—Philip—”

“I thought you were wearing the other thing,” Philip stammers.

Lukas looks down at himself. “Oh, I changed it—you don’t like this?”

“No, I love this,” Philip says, walking up to him and sliding his hands around his middle. “This is that shirt I showed you in—”

“I know,” Lukas says, beaming. “I went back and got it.”

“You went back and got it,” Philip repeats, grinning at him.

“Yeah, I could tell you really liked it,” Lukas says, “and I wanted you to think I looked hot on our wedding day, so—”

“You always look hot, but this really…” He touches Lukas’s chest. The shirt isn’t see-through or sheer but it suggests that look, the material so light and airy, but still conforming to the way Lukas’s body moves. “Yeah, it’s really hot.”

Lukas chuckles, leaning down and smashing their mouths together.

“Okay,” Helen’s voice says, as she pushes the door open a little more. “Let’s not ruffle each other up, it’s time to go.”

Lukas pulls back and they both turn to look at her. “Time to go?” he asks, in a near squeak. Philip covers his mouth, trying not to laugh. 

“Yeah,” Helen says, joy in her eyes as she looks them over.

“You’ve got the rings?” Philip asks, still holding on to Lukas’s arms. “The real ones?”

“Yes we did,” Helen says. “We’ll meet you down there, but don’t uh—don’t take forever, everybody’s waiting.” She looks at them for a long moment, taking them in, and then she reaches into the pocket of her dress and pulls out her phone. They pose on instinct, Lukas leaning his head on Philip’s, and Philip can’t even count how many pictures she takes. She doesn’t say anything else, just looks them up and down like she’s trying to remember every detail, and then she quickly hustles out the door.

Lukas pulls Philip into a hug. They don’t say anything either—Philip just closes his eyes and holds on to Lukas, the two of them swaying back and forth.

_You’re amazing. I mean, you’re awesome._ The words echo in his ears. Times past, love growing in the midst of fear and uncertainty. All that horror giving way to softness, dedication, the kind of relationship he could only dream about. He realizes he doesn’t need to focus hard on all this to keep it in place. He’s found something special, and it’s simply part of his life now.

“Let’s go get married, babe,” Philip says, kissing Lukas’s neck.

“Yeah,” Lukas says, when they break apart. “Yeah, that sounds fun.”

~

The house looks a lot cleaner than it probably ever has, all the pillows on the couch arranged just so, the blankets folded up perfectly, nothing on the counters in the kitchen. Their boutonnieres are sitting on the table, and they manage to pin them to their clothes without stabbing each other, though it comes close. They take selfies, share kisses, try not to waste too much time. Philip knows they’re gonna have plenty of professional photos, but he definitely wants some of his own. 

He holds tight to Lukas’s hand as they make their way outside. The cocktail hour (or forty minutes whatever the hell) was in front of the house, and all the servers are cleaning up now, no more food in sight. 

“Wow, there aren’t even that many people here,” Philip says. “I’m surprised all of that food went.”

“Yeah, I wanted another one of those mini pizza things,” Lukas says, pouting.

Philip sighs.

“You nervous?” Lukas asks, as they start towards the barn. 

“I sorta wish we were drunk for this one too,” Philip says. He doesn’t know why he’s freaking out. Maybe because most of their families and friends are here. But it’s fine. It’s totally fine.

“How long are your vows?” Lukas asks.

“Not too long,” Philip says, looking up when he sees Helen, Bo, Sarah and the dogs hovering around outside the barn doors.

“Did you memorize them?” Lukas asks.

Philip scoffs. “No. I wrote them down.”

“On actual paper?” Lukas asks, his eyes wide.

“Uh-huh,” Philip says, smiling.

“Ugh, I have mine on my phone,” Lukas says. “Is that gonna look stupid?” 

“Of course not,” Philip says. “It’s our wedding. You can do whatever you want.”

They climb up to where the others are and Philip can hear everybody talking inside. He’s glad they don’t know a lot of people, because this is enough. This is almost too much. 

“How’s your finger?” Lukas asks his dad, giving him a wary look.

Bo rolls his eyes. “Fine,” he says. “Can’t believe I did something so asinine the day before your wedding.”

“You gotta keep things interesting,” Lukas says.

Philip keeps looking inside the barn where everything is set up. He can see Lukas’s grandma in there with two other women, and she looks happy. Gabe’s parents, Tony and his date, Rose and her boyfriend, every person they’ve hung out with more than twice in New York. Angela, Nathan, Simone and the kids are near the front. He sees the podium with his guestbook just inside, and the page it’s open to seems covered in notes and signatures.

“Stop counting everybody,” Helen says, smacking Philip on the arm. “They’re all the same people we had on our lists and then a couple extra dates.”

Philip peeks inside again, sees his friend Jennifer taking pictures. The dogs jump up, trying to get their attention, and both he and Lukas kneel down, ruffling their fur.

“Okay, don’t get dirty,” Sarah says. 

Philip gives Izzy a couple kisses, scratching Samson behind his ears.

“Alright, boys,” Bo says. “You ready?”

They stand back up and Philip heaves a sigh. He looks at Lukas. 

“Yeah,” Lukas says, nodding at Philip like he’s asking him, too.

“Yeah,” Philip says, getting that weird drunk slow feeling again. 

“Okay,” Bo says, clapping Lukas on the shoulder and doing the same to Philip. Helen leans in to kiss them both on the cheek, and before Philip knows it the music is starting and they’re starting into the barn without another word.

“We got this,” Lukas says, as Philip hears the camera snapping. “Just look at me the whole time.”

“Then I’ll fall,” Philip says, laughing.

“I’ll hold you up,” Lukas says. 

“Then we’ll both fall.”

Helen and Bo make it to the end of the aisle and stand on their respective sides, and then everybody turns, suddenly looking at Philip and Lukas. They all rise to their feet.

“They all look so happy,” Philip says, through a gritted smile.

“Go on, you two,” Sarah says, motioning them into the barn.

They start walking, and then Philip really feels drunk again. The barn looks even better than it did when they first got here, all the lights on and shimmering off the hay and the walls. They’ve got wood planking between the benches and down the main aisle, little white flower petals under their feet. The bouquets look fucking awesome, like wild flowers, not too fancy. Jennifer stands off to the side and takes a bunch of photos of them, and Philip feels really really stupid—until Lukas squeezes his hand and makes him look up at him. Lukas leans in, pressing a long kiss to Philip’s cheek, keeping on until Philip laughs, closing his eyes. Philip can vaguely hear the crowd laughing, aww-ing, and he tries to focus on Lukas. He’s so not used to being the center of attention, and it makes him more nervous than he already is.

_But we’re already married. It doesn’t matter, it’s fine, it’s all gonna be okay._

They finally stop walking right in front of Gabe, who beams at them. Philip can hear everybody sit down and he sucks in a breath. The music fades out. He and Lukas turn towards each other and Lukas takes his other hand, just like they rehearsed yesterday, and locks eyes with him. 

“I’m gonna keep this short,” Gabe says. “Because this day isn’t about me, it’s about Philip and Lukas. These two have been through things that no person should have to endure, but they held fast to each other through the hard times and came out the other side. I hear their passion for each other in every conversation I have with them both, separately or together, and I see it with every move they make. They’re a team, a unit, a couple that helps raise each other up instead of tearing each other down. They worked past impossible odds to find what they have today. They changed for each other, they embarked on a journey that they could only take together. Philip and Lukas, to me, are the definition of soulmates.”

Philip blinks fast, trying to keep his focus. It’s making him a lot more emotional than it did yesterday and he swallows hard, smiling at Lukas.

“I support this couple in their endeavor to marry,” Gabe says. “As does Bo Waldenbeck—” Bo steps forward, patting Lukas on the shoulder. “And Helen Torrance.” Philip feels Helen move in, pressing another kiss to his cheek. He smiles and a tear falls, but Lukas quickly lets go of his hand to reach up and wipe it away. Philip leans into his palm, trying not to shake too hard.

“Lukas,” Gabe says, nodding towards him. “Your vows.”

Lukas clears his throat loudly, letting go of both of Philip’s hands and reaching into his pocket, pulling out his phone. He clears his throat again, briefly looking up at Philip and biting his lower lip. Philip can see his hands are trembling. He wonders how the hell they came up with their Vegas vows on the spot. Their drunk selves must be fucking superheroes. 

Lukas seems to find what he was looking for, because he straightens up a little bit. 

“I never knew I’d be able to have the life I wanted. Not until I saw you three aisles away from me in the drug store. I was messed up then, the real me somewhere deep inside my own head, but I couldn’t deny what I felt. It wasn’t just physical attraction, though that was definitely part of it—” He looks up, mischievous again, and Philip hears people laugh along with him. 

“But it was uh,” Lukas continues, looking back down at his phone, “the kind of attraction where I knew I couldn’t break it, no matter how hard I tried. Philip—It was like I’d known you in a different life, and I’d never been happier than when I stopped trying to fight what I felt for you. But you top that happiness now, every day. Every day you exist and I’m happier than I ever thought I could be. You give me the freedom I never thought I’d be able to find. So I vow to protect you, and your kindness, and your sincerity, and that sassy streak that I love so much. I vow to meet you step by step in every adventure we choose to go on together. I vow to have and hold you no matter what happens, no matter where we go, what we do, for as long as we both shall live. Please keep taking pictures, baby, because I want to see the world through your eyes. That’s exactly how I want to live.” He locks his phone and puts it back into his pocket.

Philip is a fucking mess. His whole face is crumpled and what’s supposed to be a laugh comes out as a sob, and he steps forward, crashing into Lukas’s chest. He can hear everybody crying and laughing too and he has no idea how the hell he’s even gonna talk now. He doesn’t know how they decided on Lukas going first. He lets Lukas pet his hair for a couple moments and then he sniffles, grabbing Lukas’s hand and kissing it before he steps back again. 

He reaches into his pocket and pulls out the paper he wrote the other night, hoping it’s still decent. He scrubs at his eyes and looks at Lukas again—he looks particularly satisfied with himself. 

Philip draws in a breath and starts talking. “I’ve always felt like it was sort of corny to say home was a person, but I realized that I had become one of those corny people when I fell in love with you. I’ve never wanted to fight for somebody more, I’ve never wanted to build somebody up like I wanted to do with you. It’s been an incredible thing, watching you realize that who you are is beautiful, and I can’t wait to be with you every step of the way in your journey to realizing that you’re probably the coolest and most amazing person of all time.”

He looks up and Lukas is grinning at him, shaking his head like he still doesn’t believe it. 

He can’t believe they both mentioned freedom, so he gears up to read the next line. “Being with you makes me feel free, whether we’re on the back of your bike and sitting in our living room watching the same episode of a tv show that you’ve fallen asleep on three times.” He grins, nearly crumpling the paper under the weight of his unbearable fondness for the most precious human being in the world. He sucks in a breath. “Every day I wanna thank you for the chance you took on me. For letting me in. For letting me love you. I’m so proud of what we are, how we held up under what we went through. You’re never gonna have to go through anything again without me by your side. I’m here in sickness and health, til death do us part, except we won’t part then. Sorry, Lukas, but I plan to stick with you in this world and the next, and everything after that.”

Lukas’s eyes are shining with tears and he tries to step in closer, clearly trying to kiss him, but Gabe stops him with a hand on his chest. Everybody laughs. Lukas blushes and Philip folds up his paper, putting it in his back pocket. 

“Now we’ll have…the rings,” Gabe says, a little loudly.

Philip turns to look and he almost has a fucking conniption because it’s cuter than he ever could have imagined, and his emotions are already running rampant. The dogs both have these blue pillows wrapped around them and sitting on their backs, the rings snug in the middle of them, and everybody aw’s when they see them coming. Samson is trotting like he knows he’s getting a treat at the end of this walk and Izzy looks happier than Philip has ever seen her, in the lead and obviously very fluffy from a recently brushing. 

Philip and Lukas both bend to meet them, giving them lots of love and the treats Sarah hands them. They quickly retrieve the rings without the dogs shaking them off, and then Sarah ushers them over to the empty seat that was left for her at the end of the first row. 

“Sit,” Philip whispers, and he watches them both do it on the first try, which is a shock. Sarah laughs, reaching around and starting to take the pillows off.

“Okay, boys,” Gabe says. 

Lukas takes Philip’s hand, and he can feel his heart speed up again. He slips the ring on his finger, his hands trembling, and then Philip does the same to him, really wanting to kiss his hand again but holding himself back. 

“Lukas,” Gabe says. “I think I know the answer to this question, but do you take Philip to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

“Absolutely I do,” Lukas says, his head held high. He brushes his thumbs back and forth across Philip’s knuckles.

Philip swears in his head. He can’t believe he has him. He really can’t believe that he has him.

“Philip,” Gabe says, and Philip looks at him, sees all the pride in his eyes. “Do you take Lukas to be your lawfully wedded husband?”

“Yes,” Philip says, looking at Lukas again. His whole life flashes before his eyes, every ragged moment and every shining bit of happiness. He can hear her, feel her close to him. _He seems like a really sweet kid._

_…I’m glad you’re safe…_

_…I’m glad you’re safe now…_

_…I’m glad you’re happy, Philip…_

“I do,” Philip says, meeting Lukas’s eyes. 

“And with that, and the power vested in me,” Gabe says. “I pronounce the two of you married.”

Lukas doesn’t wait, and against the wave of clapping he draws Philip to him and presses their lips together. It’s a soft kiss but a hard one at the same time, and Philip wraps his arms around his neck, the two of them leaning back a little bit. 

He can’t fucking believe they made it here.

The kiss breaks and they just gaze at each other, both laughing, Lukas reaching up to touch Philip’s cheek like he isn’t sure he’s real. They hug each other then, holding tight, and then they both turn around, Lukas hugging Bo and Philp hugging Helen. Everybody is still clapping, a few people cheering, and the dogs start to howl and bark too, needing to add their voices to the mix.

“I’m so proud of you,” Helen whispers, rubbing Philip’s back.

“Thank you,” he whispers. “Thank you, thank you.”

Gabe grabs him next, and he’s still laughing, pure joy in his voice. He hauls Lukas in close too. “Better than your Vegas wedding, right?”

“Right,” Lukas says, laughing.

Philip laughs too and then his heart rattles, realizing what was just said, out loud. When he leans back he sees the look on Gabe’s face, horror at his mistake. Philip turns and sees Helen, and it’s clear as day that she fucking heard. Bo has the same look on his face. Pure confusion. Philip’s heart is hammering against his rib cage and Lukas tugs a little bit at his arm, making him face the crowd. Philip tries to focus on their smiling faces, how happy they all look, and Jennifer swoops around, taking more pictures of them. 

“Let’s just—walk out,” Lukas says, muttering through his smile. “Just hold onto my hand and we’ll—deal with this outside.”

“Okay,” Philip says, sighing. 

“Or maybe we can just—run to the car and drive away and never come back,” Lukas says, still smiling and nodding at people.

“Oh God,” Philip says.

They walk back down the aisle and Philip tries to look at everybody, tries not to think about what just happened. He wonders if there’s any way to salvage it. He definitely doesn’t blame Gabe, it’s hard to not say shit sometimes, but God, Philip wishes it hadn’t happened.

Once they’re outside Helen and Bo round on them. Gabe included.

“It was just a joke,” Gabe tries.

“Vegas wedding?” Bo asks, his eyes narrowed. 

“A joke,” Gabe says, his voice breaking. “Like, since they went there—”

“No,” Philip says, shaking his head. He can’t take this. There’s no real dancing around it anymore. It’s out there. If they make it a joke now, a lie, it’ll be worse later. “We need to—”

“Guys, let’s not…ruin the wedding,” Lukas says, his shoulders tense.

“Let’s go up to the house real quick,” Gabe says. He shares a look with Philip, and Philip tries to convey with his eyes that he wants to spill the story. Gabe nods at him. Philip knows he feels bad, but he doesn’t want him to. It had to come out sometime. Philip had even been considering telling them during the reception. This is just a little early.

They all walk in silence to the house, and Philip sees Bo texting Sarah something, which he hopes has to do with keeping the guests settled or sending them over to the reception. 

“Okay,” Helen says, as soon as the front door is shut. Her tone is light and firm. “Vegas wedding? I’m sorry for the interruption, but is this really a joke, or is something—”

“We’re married already,” Lukas says, before Philip can say anything. “We got married in Vegas.”

There’s a deep sort of silence. 

“When you were there for the wedding job?” Helen asks, exchanging a look with Bo, who looks equally as shocked. “You went and had a wedding of your own?”

“Yeah,” Philip says. And that’s it. He’d been full of words every time he practiced this moment, but now they’re all lost in his head.

Another silence, even deeper.

“Philip,” Helen says, scoffing. “That has been…over a year ago.”

It doesn’t feel like it’s been that long, probably because he thinks about it all the time and they felt like they were married long before that. But yeah…it really has. Which makes it sound a lot worse. He licks his lips, shaking his head. 

“You’ve been keeping this from us for over a year?” Bo asks, his brows furrowed.

“But Gabe knew,” Helen says, glaring over at him.

“That was right after the whole appendix thing,” Philip says, knowing this won’t exactly be a good excuse. “We wanted to, uh—cheer him up—”

“He’s literally the only person who knows,” Lukas says. 

“And it wasn’t my secret to tell,” Gabe says. “Even though I…almost did, multiple times. Only secret I have from you, Helen, I swear.” She stares at him, and Philip can’t really read her expression. He knows their fights don’t last long, and he hopes this is the same.

Philip sighs.

“So you’re legally married?” Bo asks. “Or…you were…before this.”

“Yeah,” Lukas says. “And we’re…we’re sorry.”

“Why would you keep something like this?” Helen asks, her arms crossed over her chest.

Philip sucks in a breath. “Well first it was just embarrassing, but then it just—too much time had passed…we knew you wouldn’t have been happy about us fucking up the wedding, running around drunk in Vegas—”

“Stop,” Helen says, and Philip shuts up. “This was an accidental wedding. You got married by accident, because you were drunk.”

They both nod. Philip’s mouth is dry. 

Helen closes her eyes and looks like she’s thinking it through. She seems like she has a ton of things to say about this new revelation, but her jaw almost looks wired shut. Bo just looks confused and kind of horrified. 

“We’re sorry we lied,” Lukas says again. “It just sorta—got away from us, but it doesn’t matter because this is—this is the real wedding. This is the one that mattered.”

Helen is silent for another minute before she nods. “Let’s get back to it, then,” she says. “We’ve wasted enough time, they’re probably wondering what the hell is going on.” She starts walking, opening up the door and heading back outside. 

Philip rushes to catch up with her, leaving Lukas, Gabe and Bo behind. It’s snowing a little harder and he knows they’re gonna have to grab their nice jackets soon. “Hey, hey,” he says. He reaches out and takes Helen’s arm, making her slow down. “Listen, I’m—”

“I don’t want to ruin your second wedding by discussing this anymore, Philip,” she says. 

“Please don’t be mad,” he says. “It’ll be ruined if you’re mad.”

She sighs, looking down at her feet. 

“I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you for a long time now,” Philip says. 

“I think it may have been better had you told me immediately,” she says. “And knowing Gabe knew, all this time…and you guys said the other day, you were going to get your license, but you obviously already had it…”

He hears her. Lies upon lies. It really sucks, he knows it does. “We really did let it get away from us,” Philip says. “I was…really scared to tell you, because we sorta put ourselves in a dangerous situation, running around Vegas blacked out.” He shakes his head. “I knew you wouldn’t like that, I knew it would make us look—untrustworthy, I guess. I just—want you to think I’m a responsible adult and that sorta…made me look real bad. And I know how much you’ve been looking forward to the wedding and I just—we messed that up and we didn’t mean to and there was no real fixing it. So we just kept hiding it and hiding it until that….also became part of the problem.”

“I thought you had learned that lesson,” she says, finally meeting his eyes.

He doesn’t seem to be doing good here, and he’s sorta panicking. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m really, really sorry it happened and I’m sorry we didn’t tell you guys, it was…stupid.”

She just nods, but she still looks disappointed. He hates that, after all this time. Seeing that look in her eye. 

“Do you wanna know a secret nobody else knows?” he rattles off, before he even really thinks about it.

She cocks her head at him. “What?” she asks slowly, cautiously.

He thinks fast, something that could do the least damage. An idea pops into his head. He doesn’t really think it through, because he knows it’ll be fine. It’ll be totally fine. “Lukas and I…are considering adoption for the future.”

Her whole face lights up. “Oh Philip, really?”

Uh oh. “Mmhm,” he hums, his lips pressed tight together. 

“Philip, that’s….that’s wonderful. That’s so good to hear, I can’t—” She stops talking and just smiles wide. She leans in to hug him, a bone crushing hug.

“Just, like—don’t tell anybody quite yet,” he says, hugging her back. “We’re still—talking about it. We’ll tell Gabe and Bo next, when we’re—more sure.”

“Okay,” she says, and pulls back, her hands on his shoulders. “Just—no more hiding big secrets, kid. I mean—you’re an adult, you’re allowed to have your own stuff, like this, things you’re still discussing and working through….but things like this Vegas thing—just tell me. I’ll deal with it.” She smiles then, looking around. “But, selfishly…I am glad you just told me the other thing.”

“Good,” Philip says, sighing as she hugs him again.

~

They walk around to the backyard a few minutes later, Philip taking Lukas’s hand and falling back from the others.

“Dad’s fine now,” Lukas says. “I told him the whole deal and begged for him not to be mad and he kinda seemed to think it was funny.”

“Good,” Philip says, chewing on his lower lip.

“What about Helen?” Lukas asks, looking up towards where she is. “She seems okay.”

Philip figures he better just say it. “If she, uh—asks you if you wanna have a baby, just seem really excited.”

Lukas whips his head down and Philip purposefully tries not to look at him. “You told her we’re having a baby?”

Philip snorts, grinning. “We’re not—we can’t just have a baby. We can’t just acquire a baby.”

“Well what?”

“I just told her we’re maybe thinking of adoption because she really needed to hear something good,” Philip says, the noise of the party reaching his ears. He realizes he’s dragging Lukas along because he’s still staring down at him. “What?” he asks.

“Are we….thinking of…”

“Not right now,” Philip says. They can barely take care of themselves and the two dogs, let alone a baby. They’d have to move. Maybe have steadier jobs, maybe he’d have to work for a magazine or something, maybe Lukas would have to be on a more regimented—no. His thoughts are getting a little too ahead of him. He stops walking and Lukas stops too, and Philip leans up and kisses him on the cheek. “C’mon,” he says. “Just…drink some champagne, you’ll be fine.”

~  
~

Lukas slow dances with a boy to _Can’t take my eyes off of you_. The boy. His boy. In front of people. At his wedding. His very gay wedding. A boy he loves so much he married him twice. He only has one glass of champagne but it goes straight to his head because he’s on top of the fucking world. 

The DJ works out, though Lukas is still a little wary of him looking at Philip too much. They both dance with Helen and then they both dance with Sarah, and then Lukas dances with his dad to Bruno Mars and nearly throws up he laughs so hard. 

Angela comes up to him after they smash the cake in each other’s faces, and Philip is insisting on bringing pieces to everybody even though they have people to do that.

“Do you need cake?” Lukas asks, slicing another piece. 

“Did you two get married in Vegas when you went there?” she asks, raising an eyebrow. “I’ve heard rumors…”

“Jesus,” Lukas says, laughing. “My dad?”

“Sorry, I can’t give away the name of my source…”

“My dad,” Lukas says again. He looks over at Dad, who’s laughing his ass off with Gabe.

Dad raises his glass. “Happy Wedding Day, Lukas!” he calls. Everybody else does it too because that’s what’s been happening all night any time anybody congratulates them loud enough, or any time they kiss. It’s sorta weird but Lukas likes it, and he takes a sip of his drink.

“So how was it?” Angela asks. “Did an Elvis marry you?”

“No,” Lukas says. “A nice old lady. That we met for real the next day because we were too goddamn drunk to remember.”

Angela laughs. “Hoo boy, you two are a trip.”

Both Philip and Tony come rushing up to Lukas and the cake table, each of them holding a plate with a slice of cake and clearly trying to talk over each other. They stop in front of him, nearly knocking Angela out of the way, but instead of looking put-out she looks excited to be close to the action, gesturing for Nathan to come over. He does, his daughter Kayla on his shoulders.

“What’s happening?” Nathan whispers.

“Looks like some drama,” Angela says.

“So this one,” Tony says, nodding towards Philip.

“No, no,” Philip says, shaking his head.

“Yes, yes,” Tony says, cackling. “This one here, Waldenbeck, this one was telling me about your Vegas adventures—”

Lukas widens his eyes at Philip, but Philip is still stammering. “Lukas, your dad is already telling _everybody_ —”

“—and Philip was kindly filling in all the exciting details,” Tony says. “Including where this precious new puppy came from, and a certain new piercing—”

“Oh my God,” Lukas says, bracing his hands on the cake table behind him. 

“Bo had, essentially, already told—”

“So wait,” Nathan says, reaching up to cover Kayla’s ears with his hands. “Lukas—where exactly is this piercing?”

“Yeah, I’m interested too,” Angela says, raising her eyebrows.

Tony is laughing like he’s never fucking laughed before.

Philip smiles, stepping forward and pressing a long kiss to Lukas’s mouth before he can say anything. “You remember that I love you, right?” Philip asks.

“Uh huh,” Lukas says, trying not to smile at him.

“Now, Philip, don’t distract him,” Nathan says, and Angela starts to laugh when she exchanges a look with Tony. “There’s a very important question in the air.”

Lukas sighs, shaking his head at all of them. “This is not appropriate wedding talk.”

“Uh, I expect a group text later,” Angela says.

Lukas can’t help but smile, rolling his eyes.

“Come on,” Philip says. “You need another piece of cake.”

~

The party goes on for four hours until Grandma has to go, and then the rest of them start tapering off. Everyone seems to hug them longer than they normally would—lots of plans are made, well wishes are paid and Lukas feels lighter and more carefree than he has in a while. Gabe apologizes about the way he spilled the secret a million times, but they assure him it was probably time for it to come out. And anyways, it feels pretty resolved now. Helen thinks they’re thinking about adopting a baby. And maybe now Lukas is thinking about it because Philip fucking said it.

He hasn’t really thought about it very much at all, before tonight.

But not right now.

But one day.

Maybe.

Probably.

He spends a lot more time saying goodbye to the dogs for the night for some reason, rolling around on the ground with them and only briefly thinking about how he’s gonna have to wash this outfit asap.

“We’ve got all the gifts in the storage containers,” Dad says. “They’ll fit in the trunk, easy.”

“Does that mean we didn’t get enough?” Lukas asks.

“Oh, you got plenty,” Dad says. Lukas grins. He’s super eager to open them when they get home and see all the stuff they got.

“Please drive safe,” Helen says, hugging Philip as he gets into the driver’s seat, and then she walks around and hugs Lukas too. “You’re both sober, right?”

“I had my last drink three hours ago and I drank like five glasses of water since,” Philip says. Lukas hears the weird noise the car makes when it connects to Philip’s phone. The last song they had playing comes back on. _Temporary Love._

“Same, more or less,” Lukas says. 

Dad finishes loading their overnight bags into the back seat and stands next to Gabe and Sarah. “What time are you coming back tomorrow?”

“No idea,” Lukas says, still standing with the car door open. 

“We’ll probably sleep in,” Philip says.

“Well text me, we’ll come over for breakfast. Or brunch, whatever.”

“Okay,” Lukas says. “Thank you guys so, so much for this amazing wedding. It was awesome, it was so good.”

“Yes,” Philip says. “Thank you so much, thank you.”

“Of course,” Helen says, crossing her arms over her chest. “Drive safe, I mean it.”

“Yes ma’am,” Philip says, as Lukas gets into the car and shuts the door behind him. “And you guys go to bed, it’s past your bedtimes.”

“Get on out of here, kid,” Gabe says. “Enjoy your wedding night! Do you need protection?”

“Oh my God,” Philip says, rolling up the window as Dad and Gabe break into hysterics. Lukas can hear Sarah say _leave them alone!_ before Philip waves and starts to drive towards Poughkeepsie.

~

They drive on the back roads, the same way they usually take. The snow is falling and it looks like little fireballs against the setting sun. 

Lukas looks over at Philip. Usually he’s not the happiest driver, but he seems calm now, a small smile on his face. 

“I’m glad everybody we love was there,” Lukas says, picking at his thumbs in his lap. “Everybody who could be.” But he knows Anne and his mom were watching. He could feel it.

“Me too,” Philip says. “Even though we had the little…bump in the road in the middle there, the day was still awesome. I’m glad we had a regular wedding.”

“Me too,” Lukas says, with a little laugh. He’s glad they have both memories, but he knows it’s important to have this one. He gazes at Philip for a second. “I’m glad everybody was there to see how much I love you.”

Philip looks at him briefly, almost like he’s surprised by the sentiment. Lukas sees him swallow hard. “I love you too,” Philip says. They drive a little further in silence, and then Philip pulls off on the side of the road into the grass, a little ways away from the nearest street light.

“What’s wrong?” Lukas asks, once Philip puts the car into park. “You okay?” 

Philip looks at him, nodding. He locks the car doors and turns off the lights. 

“What’s happening?” Lukas asks, laughing a little bit. “You gonna kill me? Was this your plan all along?”

“You’re so stupid,” Philip says, laughing. Then, he unceremoniously climbs into the back seat, his long legs kicking up into the air. Lukas watches him, sees him toss their duffels to the ground and then lay down, beginning to take off his pants.

“What are you doing?” Lukas asks, his eyes wide.

“I wanna mess around in the car,” Philip says, a twinkle in his eye, raising his hips up so he can shimmy out of his khakis. 

“Why?” Lukas asks, already climbing into the backseat to join him. 

“Because we don’t have a car,” Philip says, tossing his pants aside. He reaches over and unzips his own duffel, dragging out a blanket and the bottle of lube. “And it’s our wedding night. And I want you. Right now.”

It really was a stupid question.

Lukas stretches the blanket out underneath Philip without being asked. They both barely fit back here together, and Lukas’s right knee keeps almost slipping off the seat. But Philip’s got that look in his eye that makes Lukas’s heart pulse and his stomach drop, and he starts unbuckling his own pants, too. Once he’s out of them he leans down, spreading himself out on top of Philip. “What if a cop comes by?” Lukas whispers, kissing the shell of Philip’s ear. The song changes to _Nothing’s Gonna Hurt You, Baby_ and Lukas grinds down a little bit.

“They won’t,” Philip says. 

“How do you know that?” Lukas asks, licking a stripe up Philip’s cheek and making him shiver.

“Because I know for like…a fact that Helen and Gabe have pulled off close to here more than once and never gotten caught.”

“Ugh,” Lukas groans, closing his eyes tight. He loves them but he definitely doesn’t wanna think about that.

“I know,” Philip laughs. “But it’s fine—we’ll be fast, anyways.”

“Oh, we’ll be fast?” Lukas asks, bracing his elbows on either side of Philip’s head and peering down at him. “Is that a challenge?”

Philip’s eyes flash and Lukas shakes his head, leaning down to kiss him. Lukas’s heart rages in his chest as he lavishes Philip with kisses, touching him all over, getting rid of their boxer-briefs. Not one car passes by outside the window. Lukas could get Philip ready in his sleep nowadays, and as he pumps three fingers in and out of him he presses his palm flat to Philip’s chest, feeling how his breath comes fast and how his heart flutters. He’ll never get tired of the way Philip moans.

Lukas pushes inside him and watches Philip’s face. He knows they’ve been married since Vegas but now they’re married publically, now they can wear rings openly, now everybody knows. He knows he’s an idiot but he keeps thinking about how this is the first time they’re having Married Sex. In a rental car on the side of the road.

Somehow, it’s perfect. 

“Lukas,” Philip gasps, as they rock together. He wraps his arms around Lukas’s neck and tangles his fingers in his hair. “Fuck, do you know how hot you are?”

Lukas laughs, leaning down and peppering kisses to Philip’s mouth. “Not as hot as you.”

Philip moans, tipping his head back, and Lukas starts sucking at his neck. He reaches down and hitches one of Philip’s legs up around his hip, pressing them impossibly close, and he knows how much Philip likes that. Lukas kisses along his chin, runs his hand up and down his thigh.

“You’re so gorgeous, baby,” Lukas whispers, thrusting a little faster.

“You married me,” Philip says, their noses bumping together. 

“Fuck yeah, I did,” Lukas says, kissing him again, sinking his tongue into his mouth. Electricity is already running through his veins, heat blooming between them. 

_“WE BUILT THIS CITY!”_

Lukas nearly chokes when he hears it, his hips stuttering and his heart leaping up into his throat.

_“WE BUILT THIS CITY ON ROCK AND ROLL”_

It’s Helen’s ringtone, coming through the car stereo loud as fucking can be because Philip’s phone is connected to the goddamn car Bluetooth. It rips through Lukas’s entire body in a terrifying surge.

“Oh my God,” Lukas mutters, breathing hard. “Oh my God I just had a heart attack.”

Philip laughs a little bit, covering his eyes. “Can—there’s a console there for the back seat, just—just hang it up—”

_“BUILT THIS CITY! WE BUILT THIS CITY ON ROCK AND ROLLLLLLLLLL”_

“Oh my God, I’m gonna lose my mind,” Lukas mutters, slipping out of Philip a little bit as he reaches for the console. “Which button—”

“Middle one, I think—”

“You think??” Lukas exclaims, reaching and straining as far as he can to reach the middle button. He presses it and Starship stops abruptly, their music coming back on a lot softer than the ringtone was. He moves back to Philip, pushing the rest of the way back into him, watching his jaw drop a little. “Why the fuck is the ringtone so much louder than the music?” Lukas asks, softly. 

Philip grins, touching Lukas’s neck. “No idea, but it scared me half to death.”

“Same,” Lukas says, leaning in to kiss him. He starts moving again, the two of them breathing heavily. Lukas is throbbing. He doesn’t know how long he’s gonna last, despite the interruption. 

“PHILIP?”

Lukas gasps, immediately halting his movements, and Philip slaps his hand over his mouth, his eyes completely round and filled with dread.

“Philip, are you there?” Helen’s voice says, everywhere, so, so loud. Everywhere in the car. It’s literally like she’s right there with them in the back seat and it’s the worst thing ever. “I hear breathing,” she says.

Lukas widens his eyes so they’re as big as Philip’s. He doesn’t pull out, he’s so close already, though both fucking shocks have staved it off just a bit. He pokes Philip in the stomach, because he _has_ to say something. 

“Philip?” Helen says again. “Are you there, are you okay? Is something wrong?”

“I’m fine!” Philip says, his hand slipping down at the last minute. He clearly sounds like he’s been having sex, his voice rough from all the moaning and groaning he was doing, and Lukas tries his best not to move as to not draw another one out. “We’re good, sorry—the Bluetooth in this car is like—so confusing—”

“Is that why you sound far away?” she asks.

Lukas bends his head down and rests it on Philip’s shoulder. Philip whimpers a little bit and Lukas squeezes his eyes shut tight.

“Uh, yes,” Philip says. “What’s up?”

“I just know you wanted to try and save your boutonnieres,” she says. “So as soon you get into the hotel room, hang them up upside down so they can dry out and still look nice.”

“Okay, awesome,” Philip says, gasping a little bit as he tries to adjust his leg. “Thank you!”

“Okay!” Helen says. “Is Lukas still there? Are you guys getting gas or something?”

“Yeah, I’m here!” Lukas says, way too loud. “Driving, just driving!”

She’s quiet for a couple seconds. “Okay, good! Okay…sleep good tonight, we’ll see you in the morning!”

“Okay, see you then!” both of them say at the same time, and it definitely sounds kinda manic. 

“You two sure you’re okay?” she asks. “You’d tell me if you ran out of gas or something, right?”

“Definitely, definitely good,” Philip says. 

“Okay…” she trails off. “Listen, I’m sorry everything happened earlier, we should definitely have a deeper discussion about it soon, but I promise I’m fine. Don’t worry about me.”

Lukas tries not to sigh too loud.

“It’s okay, thank—thank you,” Philip says. “We’ll definitely…talk about it.”

“Okay, good,” Helen says. And then there’s silence. But she hasn’t hung up.

“Goodnight, love you!” Philip calls.

“Yeah, same!” Lukas says.

“Love you guys too,” she says, and then the call finally ends. 

“Oh my God,” Lukas breathes, shaking his head.

“Okay, maybe we should just call this a loss,” Philip says, rubbing his hand over his forehead. 

Lukas juts forward into him and Philip moans, his brows knitting together. Lukas mouths at the curve of Philip’s neck. “Yeah, it was super awkward and horrifying and I hate car Bluetooth now,” Lukas says, thrusting forward again, and Philip arches up to meet him. “But I still want you.”

Philip grins, reaching around and grabbing Lukas’s ass. “Yeah?”

“Oh yeah,” Lukas says, capturing his mouth in another kiss. He just hopes the fucking phone doesn’t ring again. He doesn’t know if he can handle hearing Gabe’s ringtone, _Who let the dogs out?_ screaming through the car. Philip needs to learn to pick his own goddamn tones.

But right now, he doesn’t think about that. He just thinks about how many times he can make his husband shout his name before he makes him come.

~

They hang up the boutonnieres, wash their clothes since they actually have a washer and dryer in their hotel room, and then they take a shower together. The suite is really fucking awesome, really big and nice, and Lukas feels kinda bad that their parents paid for this when they totally still have Vegas winnings put aside. He knows they need to tell them about that next. 

Lukas is laying down in the middle of the bed and Philip is hovering over him, one hand braced on his stomach as he presses kiss after kiss after kiss to Lukas’s mouth. Both of them are only wearing their boxers, because they definitely aren’t done for the night.

“We should order room service,” Lukas whispers. 

“You fuckin’ love room service,” Philip says, kissing him again. “I don’t know how you’re even thinking about food right now after everything we ate at the reception.”

“Eating is my second favorite thing after everything having to do with you,” Lukas says, tugging Philip in by his waist so he’s leaning on him more heavily. 

“How about eating food off of me?” Philip says, tantalizing, his breath hot against Lukas’s mouth. He swings one leg around so he’s straddling Lukas and he keeps kissing him slowly, running his tongue along Lukas’s lips. 

“Amazing,” Lukas says, holding him tight. “The most ideal thing.” He slides his hands around, going from freckle to freckle on Philip’s back. 

“So maybe we should order some strawberries and whipped cream like you did that time,” Philip says. “That was a great idea.” His kisses are getting deeper, making the thoughts in Lukas’s head disappear. 

“You know, I have those sometimes,” Lukas says, nodding. 

They make out for a couple minutes, and contentment settles over them. 

“I’m really excited about going to the Grand Canyon,” Philip says, kissing Lukas’s cheek. “It’s gonna be really fun, and it’ll make your dad happy.”

“Babe, as long as you’re happy, I’m happy,” Lukas says, pulling him into another kiss.

“As long as you’re there, I’m happy,” Philip says, pressing their foreheads together.

“Til the whole world ends and we have to find another planet to live on,” Lukas says, and Philip laughs, grinning hard. 

They’re married. They’re really married, and everybody knows it. He wants to tell his past self, the one that still listens from deep in the recesses of his mind. 

_We did it, man. We married the most amazing person in the universe. And it couldn’t feel more right._

**Author's Note:**

> This one was absolutely gigantic so if you made it here, thank you so much for reading. This is my longest single chapter work in college verse clocking in at fifty three pages and over twenty thousand words. There's only one more fic in college verse after this--the Grand Canyon honeymoon.
> 
> Thank you for waiting, thank you for reading, let me know what you think :)


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